Things change Get over it
by SilentVocaloid
Summary: Sequel to 'The World inside a Castle'. The students of Goverek all-boys boarding school are faced with a big problem. Change. Arthur especially isn't pleased with the way his relationship with Alfred is going. Matthew is facing problems with Gilbert, and of course Francis is the source of the problem. But what would life be without problems and changing? It'd be boring. Multi-pair
1. Guilt

**Chapter one – Guilt**

"I can't find my books! How long have I got left?"

"Hurry up! We're five minutes late, you idiot!"

"Oh _shit_. Go on – hurry up and go without me! I don't want you in a detention you don't have to be in!"

"Well I don't want to be sitting here all on my own waiting for you to come home, so I may as well be with you in the detention."

"I seriously _cannot_ find these books!"

Arthur and Alfred were late for their first day back. Of course, it was inevitable – the American was hardly ever early for anything, even with the constant planning, organising and help from Arthur. Of course it was Alfred who couldn't find his books – Arthur had kept his on top of his bookshelf for the entire summer holiday.

"I've got them!" Alfred cried, triumphantly grasping a pile of books he'd conjured from the scary mess under his and Arthur's bed, "Come on – run, run, run! Mr. Belischmidt is coming around all of the form rooms giving a talk, and I doubt he'll be too happy about us being late!"

"And whose fault is that, _idiot?_ I asked you last night if you had everything ready and you just waved me off, telling me it'd 'all be alright!' and just carried on playing that Final Fantasy game Kiku gave you!" luckily for Alfred, Arthur was only half-serious in his lectures.

"I can't help it – Final Fantasy is _such_ a good game! You _seriously_ need to play it! I never knew Kiku was so awesome! I've always kinda hated him after he sorta dated you, but he's actually a really nice guy…" Alfred mused thoughtfully.

Arthur rolled his eyes, chuckling, "I suppose I can't blame you really. I'm glad you're getting on with Kiku – I've missed being his friend, and he's been so lonely recently. Apparently there's a rumour that Heracles is coming to teach here… maybe they'll get back together…"

"But I heard that Kiku was dating that other guy…? What was his name…? The kid from the Netherlands…." Alfred muttered.

"Oh – yeah, I heard about that… He sounds kind of shady… I hope Kiku'll be okay with him…" Arthur smiled, "Kind of hard to believe that all that stuff between me and him happened two years ago…"

"It'll be two year anniversary this Easter!" Alfred whooped, tackling Arthur with a huge hug, "I'm so glad my parents sent me here."

"I'm glad too… Oh _Jesus…_ We're going to be _fifteen _this year… And Alastair and the twins are going to be _sixteen…_ Oh _God._ We're going to be adults before we even realise!" Arthur fretted, running a hand through his hair, "I don't want to be an adult. I want to stay in school, right here, right now. I don't want _anything_ to change."

Alfred smiled at his boyfriend, "Hey, Artie, don't worry about it! Everything's going to be fine! Everyone has to grow up, right? But you'll have me every step of the way! It's all going to be okay."

"Sorry for worrying so much… I need to relax a bit! You'd think you'd have rubbed off on me…"

"_Well_, if you really want to try something like _that_…" Alfred grinned mischievously, winking.

"Oh shut it, you dirty bastard! You know what I meant!" Arthur laughed, lightly hitting Alfred.

Finally they'd reached their form room, a grand total of seven minutes late. The boys sheepishly entered through the familiar door, nodding apologetically to Miss Héderváry, who was standing at the front of the class. She rolled her eyes fondly, telling the two of them to shut up and sit down.

"Now! I'm glad we finally have everyone here!" the Hungarian eyed Arthur and Alfred, "Welcome back! I hope you all had good summers. Luckily for you all, Mr. Belischmidt decided that he didn't have enough time to visit all the form rooms, so instead he'll hold a group assembly at the end of the week, welcoming you all back. Now, I have some news for you all, if you haven't guessed it already…" Miss Héderváry grinned at her class, and stood up from her seat. The entire class gaped at their teacher, seeing the enormous, bulging stomach, "I'm pregnant!"

The class stared at her for a moment, none of them entirely sure what to say, as they were all teenage boys. Owain stood up, clapping his hands excitedly, "Congratulations!"

The rest of the class followed the Welsh boy's lead, all wishing their teacher congratulations in turn. She smiled happily, clapping her hands together, "Thank you very much, boys! I'm four months along, and in November, I'll be off on leave until April next year."

"What!?"

"No, we can't have a _supply!_"

"But Miss, you're the most awesome teacher out there! No one can compare to you!"

"Quiet a second!" Miss Héderváry said, "Look, I don't want to take leave either – you all know I adore my job here, and for that reason I'm taking the minimum amount of leave possible; my doctor hates me for it, and Mr. Edelstein isn't that pleased either! But this brings me on to my next bit of personal news. Mr. Edelstein and I have decided to have our wedding a week before I'm due to come back into work, and all of you are invited. Happy now?"

There was yet another silence as the class mulled over the news, and all seemed to decide that it was a fair deal.

"So what're you going to call the baby?"

"Is it a girl or a boy?"

"In answer to all your questions, boys, I really don't know," Miss Héderváry smiled, "But now we must press on with school news, sadly, yes I know it's boring. Welcome to Year Ten, or for most of the foreigners in the room, freshman year. This year is a very important year! You will be starting to study your GCSEs; a very important exam. At the end of last year, you chose three subjects to study along with the core subjects, Maths, Science and English. Those subjects you have chosen will effect you for the rest of your education. At the end of this year and the next – that is Year Eleven or sophomore year – you will be taking around ten exams, at least one exam for every subject you've taken – sometimes subjects have more than one exam, though. Now, after those two years of studying, you'll be going off to collage, probably. But collages will only let you in if you have the right grades in the right GCSEs, so this part of your life it serious – the rest of your career – the rest of your happiness and welfare rests on these two years. Daunting I know. Now, if you're still confused, then try thinking about OWLs in Harry Potter – they're exactly the same as GCSEs. If you haven't read or watched Harry Potter, then you can go and drown yourself. Any questions?"

The class stayed silent, grinning at Miss Héderváry's nostalgic teaching methods.

"Good! Now you can catch up amongst yourselves while you wait for the bell to go," Miss Héderváry finished with a smile, and started chatting to one of the boys at the front of the class.

Meanwhile, there was a little racket going on at Kiku's desk. Arthur and Alfred exchanged a curious glance, and with a nod, the two decided to take a look at what was happening.

"But we _all_ know you love Heracles! You can't date this other guy, Kiku!" Feliciano was wailing, "Heracles! Heracles!"

"Feliciano, keep quiet and let him speak!" Ludwig said stiffly, though smiled at the Italian's chants.

"W-Well… Yes, I must admit I do miss Heracles, and Sadik to some extent, but both of them are turning eighteen this year! It's highly inappropriate… And then there's that rumour about Heracles coming to teach here and I could get him removed from his job if we were found dating… There are simply too many obstacles. So… when Lars asked me out… I said yes."

"What's goin' on, guys?" Alfred interrupted thoughtlessly, grinning stupidly. Arthur resisted the urge to whack him across the head and lecture him on his manners.

Feliciano lit up at the sight of Alfred, "Alfred! Me and Ludwig were just catching up with Kiku, 'cause we went to go and stay with uncle Roma for summer! Have you heard about this 'Lars' guy?"

"Ah, yes, we did hear rumours… So it's true?" Arthur smiled at Kiku, who avoided the Brit's gaze with a blush – Kiku had always been a bit reserved towards both the Brit and the American since their failed dating plans two years back.

"Y-Yes… It's true," Kiku practically whispered.

"But I heard some pretty nasty things about that guy, Kiku… I'd be careful. According to Gilbert he smokes some pretty shady stuff…" Alfred said, at least trying to sound sympathetic.

Kiku avoided Alfred's eyes, "He has had some problems with drugs – illegal drugs – in the past, yes. But he says he's over that now. He's quitting." Kiku didn't sound too sure though, "But he _is_ a nice guy…"

"I don't think it's that simple, Kiku…" Ludwig sighed, "You remember all those talks about drugs we had, don't you? People sometimes _want_ to quit, but they physically can't – it hurts too much."

"But…" Kiku struggled, "M-Maybe he'll be different. And you never know… all those rumours about him smoking things… they might just be rumours! I've never seen him taking drugs."

Ludwig and Feliciano sighed, knowing it was going to take some convincing the Japanese boy, "Nice to see you both," Ludwig waved feebly at Alfred and Arthur, who were moving on to go and say hello to the rest of the class.

Owain was next, who was sitting talking casually with Alastair.

"Hey, you two!" Owain smiled, waving at his brother and his friend, "How're you both? Mum's _seriously_ pissed you didn't come visit her this summer, Arthur!" Owain grinned, "You should've come! It was really good fun, right Alastair?"

Alastair grunted, "It was a lot better than when Daniel was there, I'll give you that."

"So no signs of him coming back, then?" Arthur smiled with relief.

"None. But you never know - guys like that just… pop up. Then there _is_ the small fact that the house mum's living in is actually his. I doubt he's just going to let that go…" Alastair muttered darkly.

"How's Francis?" Alfred smiled, quickly changing the subject before Alastair got too murderous.

"Being a bastard." The Scot answered glumly before Owain had chance to.

Rolling his eyes at his brother, Owain shook his head, "He's being very sweet, thank you, Alfred. Alastair's just in a mood with him because they had another fight. I suppose you heard about Francis staying with us over summer?"

"Ah yes… It did sound like a bit of a disaster waiting to happen… What happened?" Arthur said, flicking his gaze over to a pouting Alastair, who'd taken an eraser out of his bag and was picking it apart, flicking bits of it around the class.

Owain laughed awkwardly, "Try imagining one of Alastair's fights with Daniel… add in a few more swear words and racist comments and you're about right."

"Ah. Yeah, I see…" Arthur said, rolling his eyes a little, "I have to say I'm with Alastair – what do you see in the Frog?"

"Well, what do you see in Alfred?" Owain said.

"Hey!" Alfred frowned.

"I don't really know… he's just _Alfred_… that's why I like him; because he is who he is…" Arthur muttered, now bashful.

Owain turned up the corners of his lips, "Well, that's why I like Francis. It's _all_ of him, not just a single thing."

"Good point." Arthur nodded fairly, "Seems you're outvoted, Alastair."

Alastair, who hadn't actually been listening to the conversation, simply frowned at Arthur, sticking up his middle finger and requesting for him to fuck off. At that precise moment, the bell rang, so fuck off Arthur and Alfred did indeed do.

This year, the classes were getting mixed up a lot. In previous years, everyone had been lumped together into four different classes. However, in year ten and eleven, because everyone took different classes, their classes would be a lot smaller, and a lot more mixed. According to Arthur and Alfred's timetable, the only lessons the pair shared were English, maths, science and history. This was quite a few lessons, as all together they shared twenty two lessons out of the thirty they had a week. But it'd still suck to be away from each other in the remaining eight lessons.

It turned out that Arthur's first lesson was German, while Alfred's was French. Arthur was in the same class as Gilbert, Ludwig, Feliciano, Kiku, Toris, Feliks and the twins among many. Of course, Mr. Belischmidt was taking the class, along with his other classes of maths and permanent stressful job of being Head. Arthur wasn't quite sure how the man could manage so many things.

"Right class. I know you've all been taking German for three or four years now; some of you are fluent," Mr. Belischmidt flashed his eyes at his sons, "But that is no excuse for us to slack off this year. For some of you, your final exams are less than ten months away. Others, it's a year and ten months, but nevertheless, we will be studying like the exam is tomorrow morning! We will not waste a second. Now, we'll begin reviewing the things we already know; refreshing our memories, if you will. Who can tell me what I would say if I wanted to catch a train to Berlin, please?"

Mindlessly the class worked through their confusing class, repeating statements, copying sentences and thinking up conversations to each other. Arthur used to enjoy his German classes, or he had whenever he'd sat next to Alfred. Somehow the American had been able to inject fun into the painfully confusing, dry language of German. Arthur hadn't wanted to pick a language at _all,_ but sadly, it was requested to take at least one modern language; French, German or Spanish. Since there was no _way_ Arthur would _ever_ speak French that was out and Spanish wasn't taught at Goverek, so the only option left was German. Right now though, Arthur was regretting that decision, and would do anything to go and sit with Alfred in Mr. Vargas' classroom just across the hall.

Meanwhile in the very class Arthur longed to be in, Alfred was actually having quite a bit of fun.

His class held all the people that thought German was too hard to learn, or would just refuse to learn such a bland language. Of course, Francis was sitting at the front of the class showing off his fluent French, spurting French pick-up lines to Owain, who was blushing despite the fact he had no idea what the guy was saying to him. Alfred had been clever enough to sit next to Matthew, who not only was very close to fluent French, was also very generous about letting Alfred copy his work. Then of course, they had Mr. Vargas as a teacher, so that just made it one hundred percent funnier, one hundred percent easier and one hundred and ten percent better than the German classroom across the hall. Alfred wasn't quite sure an _Italian_ was in charge of French class, though. According to Matthew it was because Mr. Vargas could pretty much speak every language in Europe, though no one actually had proof of this yet.

Also in their class were the likes of Lovino and Antonio. Lovino had been a bit stuck when it came to choosing between French and German – he hated German with a passion, but then again, French was the language of perverts. He'd come to his decision upon looking over at Antonio's form, and copied whatever he put. He could just flunk the class – there was no way he was learning French. The other members of the class were made up of _Alastair_, who everyone could only assume picked French to be with Owain, and many other students who no one really knew, like a boy called Aaron, or Ben. Just _one of those blending in people._

"Aren't you missing Arthur?" Matthew asked Alfred, looking up from his reams of writing that Alfred would copy down later.

Alfred realised with a guilty jump that he _wasn't_, "Ehh… no, not really. Probably because I've been working so hard!"

Matthew raised his eyebrow, "Alfred, you wrote the date, and that is _it_."

"It took me a long time to write that!" Alfred grinned jokingly, but then his smile faded, "But do you think it's bad that I'm not missing him?"

Matthew though for a second, "No, I don't think it is. I think it's a good thing, y'know? I mean, I'm not missing Gilbert, on the contrary, I'm much enjoying the peace he's left me with. But it doesn't mean… T-That I don't l-love him…" Matthew's cheeks went bright red at the end of the sentence. He was _still_ embarrassed by such simple things about telling Gilbert he loved him, even their rather long relationship.

"Yeah… but I think that's different… Because in _your_ relationship, Gilbert's the annoying one, yeah? And he's meant to miss you when he's away from you, and you're meant to feel like you do now. But with me and Arthur, _I'm_ the annoying one, and _I'm_ meant to be missing him… What if he doesn't miss me? Oh God! What if he's enjoying time with all those German-speaking creeps? Ah, Mattie, what if our relationship doesn't work?"

"You're worrying about this _now?_ Look Alfred, there's too many 'what ifs' and 'meant to'-s in that statement, okay? Don't assume things. And who cares if you don't miss each other? That's probably a good thing, because if this relationship is going to get into the living together stage, then you'll probably both have separate jobs, which means you'll be away from each other all day. If you both wouldn't be able to manage an hour long school lesson, then there's no way you'd be able to last long."

Alfred nodded slightly, "I guess you're right… Thanks Mattie! I really don't know what I'd do without you. Speaking of favours…"

"Yes, you can copy me. Get on with it, then! I need to go and see Francis for a second," Matthew muttered absent-mindedly, wondering to the front of the class to have a word with the French boy.

Down at the front of the class, Francis looked up at Matthew's arrival.

"Ah, Matthew, _mon cher,_ what brings you to my godly realm?" Francis winked, not seeing the glare Owain shot at the Canadian.

"I was just wondering if you could help me with this?" Matthew smiled, handing Francis a sheet of paper, and when he was looking down to examine it, Matthew managed to shoot Owain an equally evil glare. Neither of the glaring boys realised Alastair was watching the entire thing with a droll grin on his face.

"_Mon cher, mon cher,_ I hate to tell you, but you have written this entire thing in the future tense! The assignment was to write it in the _past_," Francis smiled pityingly, handing back the paper, "I'm very sorry, _mon cher_."

"Ah… crap. Alfred! Stop copying that! Thank you, Francis!" Matthew ran off in a panic, trying to stop Alfred from copying the incorrect work.

The bell went five minutes later, and Alfred felt Arthur practically run into his arms. Apparently Arthur really _had_ missed Alfred, which only made the American feel guiltier than he already was. The two made their way to English, Alfred listening to Arthur rather unusual babbles about how terrible German was.

The rest of the day continued in the same fashion. Luckily for Alfred's conscience, the rest of the lessons they had that day were together. Alfred did enjoy his lessons with Arthur, but he couldn't shake off the feeling that his favourite lesson all day had been French.

_It was a fluke,_ the American told himself when eating a burger later, nervously waiting for Arthur to return from the music room, where he'd been working on yet another piece for Mr. Edelstein's tough homework standards. _It was only because Matthew was making you laugh, and it was hilarious hearing Francis with his pick-up lines._

"I'm home!" Arthuir called through, making Alfred jump out of his skin.

"Ah! What? Hi!" Alfred babbled, wide-eyed.

"What's got you so on-edge?" Arthur said, raising a huge eyebrow, smiling.

"N-Nothing. I was just watching a horror movie…" Alfred nearly hit himself – why did he lie? He didn't have to lie about that! He could've just told Arthur the truth!

Arthur chuckled, "I don't know why you put yourself through the pain of those things…" the Brit sighed, boiling some water ready for his tea-making rituals.

"What's the matter?" Alfred asked, a little worried.

"Nothing…" Arthur avoided Alfred's gaze, getting a teabag out of the cupboard.

"You're lying~"

Arthur sighed again, longer and more troubled this time as he sat down at the table, "I'm just… worried."

"About what though?"

"What if…" Arthur then blinked a few times, and decided to change his answer, "Everything's changing."

Alfred chewed on his lip a little awkwardly, "But why is that a bad thing?"

"Because I liked it how it was before… It was so easy before, I didn't have to worry about not being with you, or miss you, because I was always with you. Don't you miss that too?"

"Well, yeah… but…"

"But what if we drift apart? Even if we manage through these two years of high school, what if we meet new people in collage, university, or new jobs? Everything's going to change, and there's no going back, even if we want to." Arthur sounded really shaken up by it all… It was starting to worry Alfred.

Then the American had an idea. With a grin, Alfred swiped Arthur's tea away from him, and scooped the Brit up into his arms. Ignoring the cute little shouts of protest from Arthur, Alfred set the boy down on the bed, and swiftly unbuttoned his shirt and removed his tie and blazer. Arthur naturally got the complete wrong idea, and his face flushed with red, not really sure what to do. Alfred grinned, ignoring Arthur's questions of 'what the bloody hell are you doing?' and reached under a pillow to find a pair of Arthur's pyjamas, sliding the t-shirt over the boy's head, and swiftly removing his school trousers, replacing them with the soft material of the pyjama bottoms, Alfred smiled, and tucked Arthur into bed.

"You need to stop stressing!" said the American with a wink, "Go to sleep, and you'll feel better."

"You bloody…" Arthur started, but stopped himself, "I thought you were… y'know…"

Alfred blushed a little, "No… I still don't think we're ready."

"G-good… I don't think we're ready either…" though this time, it was Arthur doing the lying, "Goodnight…"

**A/N**

**Hello! I'm back!  
So, just in case you're a little confused, I'm setting this sequel two years after 'the world inside a castle' X'D I'm not sure why… It's probably because in September I'm going into year 10 too…  
Do you see problems arising? I see problems arising, but that's probably because I wrote them X'D tell me what you think with the reviews, okay? Maybe they'll give me some more ideas XD  
Speaking of ideas and stuff, I've realised I have no idea about how to cause relationship problems apart from jealousy and cheating o.o" so if you have any suggestions about that, then do tell me X'D I'll give you credit ^^ also, if you have any characters/pairings you want to see, tell me early on, because that'll make them easy to include!  
I'm sorry this chapter was slow/uneventful XD I watched Thor the other day. And I couldn't stop watching it. Then I saw Iron man one and two. And now I am hooked. I am _in love_.  
Thank you very much! Don't forget to follow/fave/review! :D thanks again!**


	2. Double date, double disaster

**Chapter two – Double date, double disaster**

After a week or two, everyone had fully settled down into their school routines. Students had aught up, teachers had explained the complicated classes they'd be studying over the year, changes to the ground had been explained, and everyone was back in their automatic, boring routines. Get up, get dressed, eat breakfast, school, homework, tiny bit of leisure, sleep – repeat. Though, the busy routine did make the boys very thankful for their heavenly weekends, which they now spent doing as much as they possibly could, rather than wasting them by playing video games or moping around all day, like most used to do.

That was the very reason Alfred and Arthur were sitting in the town's very newly opened Starbucks, wrapped up in scarves and hats (they were having a very cold, very windy spell of weather) opposite Owain and Francis, the pair who'd been guilty for dragging the American and the Brit into the coffee house.

"Oh God I love this place. I _can't_ get enough of it…!" Owain muttered blissfully, taking a scarily large gulp from a huge mug of coffee he was holding. Francis watched the boy like a hawk, and whenever the mug was removed, Francis swooped down, still resembling a hawk, and stole a rather… well, _French _kiss.

When he'd released Owain, Francis smirked, "There was coffee on your upper lip, _mon cher…_ Don't you just love me for licking it off for you?"

"I love you anyway, sweetie," Owain smiled up at the older boy, pecking his cheek.

Alfred and Arthur felt very close to throwing their drinks at the pair. It was nice to see such a healthy relationship between two people, but seeing Francis just pissed them off. And, although it was a hunch, Arthur was sure he saw Francis look over to him one or twice, as if to say, '_I have something you don't~_' or something to that effect.

"I don't particularly like Starbucks…" Arthur muttered, snapping the lovey-dovey couple away from their embraces.

"_WHAT!?_ Arthur! You're my brother – I trusted you! How could you betray me like this!?" Owain demanded, sounding a little too serious.

Arthur shrugged, "I don't mind the drinks and stuff…" he took a sip of whatever he'd ordered as if to prove it, "I just think too many people try to create a certain image out of themselves by coming here. It's no longer a coffee shop – it's a place where 'the cool unique/gay/out of the ordinary people come'." Arthur signalled to the people sitting on nearby tables. Sure enough, they were your typical scene-kid, artist-wanna-be, hopeful-young-writer, or the perfect example of Francis and Owain; the very, very camp gays.

"But what's wrong with that?" Francis pouted, obviously liking being one of the recognised regulars to the shop.

"Everything. If you want to show someone you're unique you should be able to do it without ordering a coffee." Arthur answered flatly. Owain looked about ready to faint, so Arthur changed the subject, "So why _did_ you drag us here?"

Francis winked, "Alfred, I think this is your cue to continue."

"It's a double date!" Alfred grinned happily; speaking for the first time in a while (he'd been enjoying a cookie).

Arthur paused for a second, "Oh! Well, why did you wait until now to tell me that…?"

Everyone looked at him with a raised eyebrow.

"Arthur, there are four of us, and each pair is dating, so when we all come out together, I think that implies it's a double-date," Francis said slowly, watching Arthur like he was a little slow.

"Well…" Arthur sounded like he was about to argue, but then gave up, "Yeah you're right."

Alfred was starting to get a little worried, "Two minutes, you guys," he said to Francis and Owain, and tapped Arthur on the arm, signalling for the Briton to follow him outside. Once the door closed and the autumn wind was blowing harshly in their faces, Alfred asked lowly, "Is everything okay?"

"Of course – why do you ask?" Arthur muttered in reply.

"I don't know… you just seem… off. You're not acting like _you_. You're actually acting like when I first met you. You have been for a while; I just didn't want to say anything. Nothing's going on, is there? Daniel hasn't appeared out of nowhere and started threatening you, has he?"

Arthur smiled half-heartedly, "No, no, nothing like that. Don't worry so much – I'm _fine_."

"Nope! You've just proved it! You said you were fine! I get a reminder pretty much every day on my Facebook news feeds that if a girl – or in your case the more submissive in our relationship – says that they're fine, then all hell is about to break loose!" Alfred said, pleased with his conclusion.

Arthur narrowed his eyes, "I am _not_ the 'girl' of our relationship! But really, I'm one hundred percent okay, okay? I have you here, so how could I possibly not be okay?"

"You so _are_ the girl! You're the smaller one, the cuter one, and if we _were_ to have sex," Alfred's voice dropped noticeably in volume, making Arthur grin, "Then I would _totally_ top you." Alfred then returned to the main subject point, "Ah, but you say you're one hundred percent okay – okay isn't _good_. So why aren't you one hundred percent happy?"

Arthur rolled his eyes, "Fine, fine, I'm the girl."

"See! You never usually give in like that! You did it to Francis a minute ago! What happened to my aggressive little Artie?" Alfred interrupted before Arthur had chance to reply to the second half of the conversation.

"I just… want a change in personality. I need to be a little nicer, I think," Arthur muttered the obvious excuse, "And I'm not one hundred percent happy because I had to sit in that damn coffee shop with those two idiots," he jerked his thumb to the window, and through it you could see Owain and Francis, coffee still in hands, kissing like there was no tomorrow.

Alfred narrowed his eyes, "No, no, there's something more. I'm stupid, so I don't know what it is yet, but I will figure it out! Just you wait! C'mon, I'm _freezing, _let's go back inside."

Arthur, who was a little irked at Alfred's ability to drop something so quickly, shook his head, "Do we have to go back in there? All they're going to do is rub it in our faces and kiss all day; there's no point in being with them. We may as well go and have some fun?"

"Sure!" Alfred agreed, though was a little confused at Arthur's choice of words – what did Francis and Owain have to 'rub in their faces' as Arthur had said…? "Where are we going?"

"I don't mind," Arthur smiled, "Surprise me!"

"Your wish is my command!" Alfred grinned, grabbing Arthur's hand, knowing just where to take the Brit to boost his happy percentage up to one hundred and ten.

* * *

"Mattie? Mattie, where'd you go? I'm back! Whaddya say about taking up Francis' offer and meeting him and the other's in Starbucks? Though that place _is_ a little expensive…" Gilbert muttered thoughtfully to himself as he walked through his and Matthew's room (they'd requested a change in roommates) looking for the Canadian. Where the hell was he? Gilbert had been over to his brother's to talk about a math's paper they'd been assigned – it was a little embarrassing that Gilbert had to ask his younger brother for help – but he'd only been half an hour or so. Surely Matthew hadn't got bored and left without him?"

"Mattie?" Gilbert called again, even checking under the bed. Then the albino realised that there _were_ to other rooms Matthew could be in. After checking the bathroom and deciding that unless Matthew could hide in drains, then the Canadian had to be in the kitchen, or he'd left.

Gilbert opened the kitchen door, and sure enough Matthew was sitting at the table, his headphones in – that must've been why he hadn't heard Gilbert's calls – completely oblivious to the fact that Gilbert was standing in the doorway. Smirking confidently, Gilbert decided that he'd try and get Matthew to scream again. He'd only managed to do it once; Matthew was _really_ hard to scare! But that one time he'd done it, Matthew had screamed _the_ most hilarious, cutest little scream. The German decided that he wouldn't mind hearing that scream again.

Creeping very, _very _quietly and sticking to the sides of the walls, the albino finally reached a safe spot behind Matthew – all that was left was to scare the Canadian! Gilbert suddenly realised it was weird how seriously he was taking this, but shook it off. He lifted his hands, ready to slam them down on Matthew's shoulders, three, two, one…

"_RAWRRR~ I'M GOING TO EAT YOU!" _Gilbert yelled at the top of his voice.

He definitely got the reaction he wanted! Matthew yelped girlishly with fear, jumping up from his seat, whimpering as he wheeled around to see Gilbert, and almost hit the albino.

"_Gilbert! I told you not to do that!" _Matthew shouted back at Gilbert, who was keeled over with laughter, "It's not funny!"

"But it is! It's _so_ funny! You thought I was going to eat you!" Gilbert choked out between laughs, but then straightened up, "I might eat you anyway though – you do look delicious!"

Rolling his eyes, Matthew put one headphone back in, sitting down, "You're starting to sound like Francis…"

Gilbert frowned at that, so decided to change the subject, "What're you writing? Is it a love letter? For me? Oh you shouldn't have!" the Albino crooned, leaning over Matthew's shoulder to see what he'd been scratching onto the paper.

Almost immediately, Matthew stiffened, realising Gilbert was reading what he was writing, and slammed the notepad shut, and sat on it, "Nothing."

"Well it's obviously not _nothing_…" Gilbert grinned, a little confused, "C'mon! Let me see!"

"No." Matthew said flatly, "Don't worry. It's just… accounts."

"_Accounts?_ Mattie, I know you're mature, but we both know you don't have accounts! You're fourteen for God's sake!" Gilbert said, still a little confused at what Matthew was hiding from him.

"Just… don't worry about it! It's really, _really_ boring stuff!" Matthew insisted.

"Look, I won't read it if you don't want me to, I just want to know _why_ I can't read it…" Gilbert backed off, raising his arms in surrender at Matthew's defensive tone, "You can tell me anything, you know. I'm not going to get pissed with you."

Matthew still shook his head, "No. It's private."

"But…" Gilbert started, and then decided that it _was_ Matthew's privacy, "Okay, you're right. I'm sorry. But Mattie?"

"Yes?"

"Promise me that if you're _really_ troubled by something… you'll tell me, won't you?" Gilbert smiled almost bashfully.

"Of course I will," Matthew returned the smile, hating himself for the lie he just told, "Come one – didn't you want to meet Francis and the others in town?"

Gilbert suddenly really didn't feel like going, "Actually I just remembered that Ludwig and Kiku needed my help with something," it was true – Kiku and Ludwig _had_ requested Gilbert's company, Gilbert had just told the pair that he had plans with Matthew, "But maybe we can go tomorrow?"

"Sure," Matthew nodded, "Bye then."

"Bye."

Both were left with the terrible feeling that they'd seriously fucked something up, they just weren't sure what, or how to fix it.

* * *

"Alfred, I'm seriously afraid I'm going to trip! Just let me see again, won't you?" Arthur growled. Alfred had covered the Brit's eyes with his hands, not letting his beloved see where Alfred was taking them.

"We're almost there! It's gunna be an _awesome_ date, Artie!" Alfred promised happily.

"It better had be! I do _not_ like walking around not being able to see!"

"Don't worry, I'm here to catch you if you fall~"

"Shut it."

"And we're here!"

Arthur was freed from Alfred's grasp and saw where they were.

They were on a boat…

_In the middle of the ocean?_

Oh thank God – Arthur wheeled around in panic and found Padstow docks just behind him. He knew Alfred was outgoing, but bloody hell, if he'd sailed them off, then Arthur would never forgive him. He'd always been afraid of being stranded at sea and being eaten by a shark.

"I had a word with the owner of this boat! He said we could use it for a bit~ and I've been taking lessons!" Alfred grinned, pleased with himself.

"You hired a boat?" Arthur mused, walking around the small rowing boat. It wasn't really a _boat_… or at least not a big, yacht boat, but it was a sweet idea. The wood looked dangerously old and close to rotting, though.

"You bet I did!" Alfred said triumphantly, "Wait, you do like it, don't you?"

Arthur smiled, "Of course I do! It's very… _you_. Completely obscure, a little bit dangerous, sweetly unique and bloody brilliant."

"I'll take that as a compliment!" Alfred beamed, walking behind Arthur and hugging him, "I thought it'd be a nice idea, y'know? And it'll get dark soon, and boats at night are romantic! Or that's what the internet told me, anyway…"

"They're very romantic, sweetie. You certainly cheered me up, you know." Arthur smiled, and he meant it this time, "So are we going to row or not?"

"Of course! Oh, by the way, the guy said it'd be a good idea to stick around the docks rather than go out to sea, in case we never return or something." Alfred stated the obvious, but Arthur didn't say anything sarcastic. Alfred had obviously put a lot of thought into this idea – he'd probably wanted a chance to show Arthur it all day. Although Arthur initial reaction had been _oh my fucking God, I'm on a fucking boat, help me_, after getting over the shock of it, he actually didn't mind the weird feeling of the water gently sloshing up against the sides of the boat.

Arthur reached down to pick up an ore, but Alfred gently prised it away from him, "No. No lady should row." The American pursed his lips.

"Oh shut it! I'm not a lady!" Arthur said, only half-serious, "But you _are _my knight in shining armour."

"Well then, that settles it – you have to be my damsel in distress! It's either a damsel or a lady; make your choice, Princess Arthuretta!" Alfred began rowing gently.

"Don't start that again!" Arthur warned with a grin, "But either way I'll get you, won't I?"

"Of course!"

"Well then I don't give a damn what I am. You could turn me into a caterpillar and I wouldn't care." Arthur muttered, now it was his turn to hug Alfred from behind.

The two sat in silence for a while with only the sound of the water around them and the few townspeople in the distance running around at the docks. Neither really minded; after all, it wasn't a particularly awkward silence. It was just _ a silence._ Arthur was pleased for some time to think to himself.

He'd been worried for a while about his relationship with Alfred, and even though they constantly reminded one another that they loved each other, they very rarely had moments like _this_ nowadays – just Alfred, Arthur and whatever setting they were in. Arthur treasured these moments, he really did. But it did make him wonder, how long would he be able to keep these dates going? He had a terrible feeling that soon, Alfred was going to get bored of him, and Arthur wasn't sure why. That's why he'd been in a pretty sour mood all day, and with Francis and Owain practically saying 'Hey! Look at us - our relationship isn't dying like yours!' with their displays of affection, which only made things worse. It really did piss Arthur off. But he knew he could only blame his annoyance on other people for so long, because deep down he was seriously pissed off with himself for letting Alfred slip through his grasp.

"Hey," Alfred whispered, just loud enough for Arthur to head, "Are your happiness levels up yet?"

"Nope, but my blissful levels are at two hundred percent." Arthur muttered back, "You?"

"Off the scale."

Arthur smiled, "We need to do this more often."

"We really do…"

The silence continued, until Alfred decided that they were in the centre of the huge dock, and that was far enough to row. The American grinned, pulling the oars inside the boat, and hugged Arthur, kissing him softly, "You know, it'd be even more romantic if it were night. I knew I should've waited a little longer… I was just so excited!"

"Well it's getting close to sunset, so we could just… sit here for a while…" Arthur suggested as casually as he could. A grin spread across Alfred's face, "I'd like that."

So the two did indeed just sat, talking about things that came into their mind. They spoke about things that mattered, and things that didn't matter. About their childhood, their plans for the future and their feelings in the present. Alfred had always wondered how couples knew the most obscure things about each other, like 'she only likes red sweets', or 'he's collected cacti all his life because he wanted to be a cowboy when he was a kid' but now, Alfred knew how people came to learn random stuff like that about one another; because couples just _do_ sit and talk like this, and they learn some amazing things that make you fall in love with them all over again.

"Hey Artie, look at this!" Alfred smiled, and picked something up, "It's like one of those note in the bottle things!" sure enough, Alfred was holding up an empty alcohol bottle, fastened with a cork. It really did look like a bottle with a missing note. Arthur suddenly felt like a pirate.

"I have an idea!" Arthur smiled, and reached into his pocket, drawing out a notebook and pen that he always kept with him for emergencies, and tore out two pieces of paper, handing one to Alfred, "What we do is we write down the exact feelings we have for each other right now, what we're feeling. But I'm not allowed to see yours, and vice versa. Then we can fold them up in here, and throw it out in the harbour, yeah? Apparently most of the junk tossed in here gets fished out, but if we ever feel… in doubt of our relationship, then we can come here and remember this day, yeah?"

Alfred was staring at Arthur, "That's fucking romantic."

"And you had to soil it with your language, didn't you?" Arthur chuckled, handing the pen to Alfred, "Come on, write it down!"

Alfred thought for a moment, and then after chewing on his lip, the American seemed to find the exact words he needed, and scribbled them on to the paper. Arthur resisted the urge to peek – the curiosity was _killing_ him – and quickly folded it up, placing it inside the bottle.

"My turn…" Arthur muttered, taking the pen. He only just realised that his hands were sweating – was he really that nervous about writing this? When he'd told Alfred the plan, he had loads of ideas of what to write, but right now, just staring at the blank paper, all of those ideas had gone. So Arthur closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and tried to notice what he was feeling, writing them all down. When he was done, he folded up the little sheet of paper, dropping it into the bottle next to Alfred's. He took the cork, pressing it into the lid so no water would get in.

"Do you want to throw it in?" Alfred offered, "It was your idea, after all."

Arthur smiled, "Thank you," he'd always loved the idea of doing a note-in-a-bottle thing, and throwing it in looked like the best part. Arthur lobbed the glass bottle as far as he could (which wasn't very far) and it landed with a little 'splash' in the water nearby, bobbing along. It wasn't long before both boys lost sight of the bottle entirely, wondering if they'd ever see it or the notes inside ever again.

"Thank you for doing that with me…" Arthur muttered quietly, grabbing Alfred's hand. The sun had set by now, and the very first stars were starting to come out, "But we'd better head back… Mr. Belischmidt will kill us if he sees us out here; I've heard he's starting to do _patrols_ out around the town…"

"Jesus…" Alfred muttered, rolling his eyes, "Five more minutes?"

"Five more minutes," Arthur confirmed. Though it turned out their 'five minutes' was a very, very long five minutes. It was also one of the best five minutes of Arthur's life.

**A/N**

**Woo~ short chapter X'D I was in Costa Coffee the other day, and the amount of wannabes in there was scary X'D then we passed a Starbucks, and there were ****_even more_****. X'D btw, don't take offence to that if you sit in Starbucks X'D I'm simply criticising the people who think they're one of the awesome Starbucks people, and they don't even know the menus off by heart X'D and before we go any further – I am not a Starbucks geek X'D but my friends are X'D  
Anyway X'D I'd better stop talking before I offend anyone X'D  
Right. You remember that happy ending in the World Inside a Castle? Well, I've got my wrecking ball out – that's right, I have a wrecking ball – and that happy ending WAS A LIE. D: Yeah, I'm going to tear it apart ****and probably have fun in the process…**** So look forward to that! 8D I have a feeling you're going to hate me X'D  
And Matthew, you're gunna get hit with the wrecking ball HARD. LOL. Not in a sexual way, sadly XD  
Speaking of sexual, a few have been wondering whether this will be having lemons X'D the answer, sadly, is no X'D it'll have mentions of sex, but not descriptions X'D so Alfie and Artie will do it, but I'll leave that up to your imagination. The reason for this, is because I'm a fourteen year old virgin, and I have no idea what sex is like X'D so you'd probably be reading your stereotypically cliché shitty smut X'D and I don't want to ruin my reputation like that X'D  
Long A/N is long X'D thank you for reviews! 8'D love you guys!  
Byebye!**


	3. Crashing Pathetically

**Chapter three – Crashing pathetically**

**(A/N – I changed the Netherlands' name to Lars – thank you _Yanelle _for telling me that!)**

"Ludwig-san, if it's not too much trouble, I'd like a word with you."

"Kiku, what's up? Sorry, I'm a little busy at the moment…" Ludwig tilted his head slightly, standing in his doorway looking down at Kiku's tiny structure. What Ludwig wanted to know is what on Earth Kiku could 'want a word' about.

"Ah, I see…" Kiku frowned slightly, "Might I ask what you're busy doing?"

"Studying, as usual…" the German sighed, holding up a large book he'd been reading before Kiku had called on him.

"I'm terribly sorry to have disturbed you. However, I must insist that I talk to you." Kiku pressed. Ludwig frowned slightly – he wasn't annoyed, simply _confused_. Kiku was never usually this up-front, so either the boy was taking on a new personality, or what he needed to talk about was quite important. Ludwig would bet anything it was the latter.

"Well, I suppose I need a bit of a break, too. Come on in," Ludwig opened the door properly, inviting Kiku in, "Would you like something to drink?" he asked, walking through to the kitchen and reaching into the cupboards for two glasses.

"Just water, please, if it's no problem," Kiku smiled, taking a seat on the small sofa, "Where's Feliciano-san?"

Ludwig shook his head, "I think he said he was going to see his brother."

"So he won't be coming back for a while?"

"No, I don't think so… why?" Ludwig asked, furrowing his brows as he sat next to Kiku, handing him his drink.

Kiku took a sip of his water, and then let it rest on his crossed knees. He sighed, and then looked up at Ludwig, his big brown eyes looking a little guilty, "I… I think you're letting studying take over your life, Ludwig-san. Don't get me wrong, I think studying is very important… and there are many people in this school that could take a lesson off you. But… tell me, what do you seek from this studying? What will you gain?"

Ludwig frowned at the question – again, in confusion rather than annoyance, "Well, I suppose I want to get into a good collage. Get into a good university," he shrugged, trying to be nonchalant, "A doctor or a lawyer… something like that. I'll get a good income, and I'll have a nice house, a stable life."

"Now, Ludwig-san, if you don't mind me asking…" Kiku said, "What would you prefer out of the following – would you prefer a stable job, like you just described, working hard and gaining a lot, but when you came home, there was no one there. Or would you prefer a lesser job, say a professor in a university, or a psychologist, but then you were able to come home to a family that you love, and be in a happier, warmer atmosphere, but with less money?"

"Well of course the second one. But what're you getting at?" Ludwig was still terribly confused, "You _can_ have a stable job _and_ a happy family…"

Kiku sighed, "Ludwig-san… I think there is no other way but to tell you straight. You're working too hard; your studies are taking over your life, and if you get into such habits at an early age, then they may well take over your life. Yes, you may manage to juggle family and work, but would it really _feel_ like a family if you only saw them for about three hours a day? Because, let's be realistic, you'd be out at nine o'clock in the morning, probably before, then get home after six, possibly seven or eight. If you've got kids, then they're probably going to go to bed around eight? The only time you're going to see your family properly is a Sunday, and you'll want to do something leisurely then! Without even intending it, you'll grow distant from your family, Ludwig-san."

"Kiku, what're you _talking_ about? I can see that makes sense, but I doubt it'd be triggered by me studying too hard in high school… I can decide my future, and if I decide that being a doctor doesn't give me enough time with those I love, then I'll switch jobs; I'll have to qualifications, so it'll be easy. I can just be a medical professor, as you say. I don't think I need to worry about this _now_, surely?" Ludwig wasn't aggressive with his tone, but he wasn't exactly soft either.

The Japanese boy sighed, re-folding his legs, "When was the last time you went on a date with Feliciano-san?"

Narrowing his eyes at the odd question, Ludwig cast his mind back, "Last Saturday, why do you ask?"

"I have… had a chat with him. He feels that you two're not what you used to be. It's not that you don't care about him – please don't think I'm saying that. He just thinks that sometimes you value your work more than him," Kiku tried to phrase his words as diplomatically as possible.

"But of course that's not true! I love him, and nothing will change that, especially not my _work_. Why does he think that?" Ludwig didn't seem offended Kiku realised with relief, he seriously seemed terrified about the situation. Well, at least that proved he cared.

"Well… From what I've heard on your last date and many dates previously… I-I heard you got distracted with work in the middle, or wouldn't stop talking about your science work, or repeating maths equations you have to learn. I-I don't know if it's completely true – we all know Feliciano-san exaggerates a little, but I think you need to take his words into consideration, Ludwig-san." Kiku bowed his head, "I'm sorry for bothering you. Thank you for your time, Ludwig-san. And really, I'm not saying this to be spiteful; I really worry about you."

Ludwig nodded thoughtfully, standing up to see Kiku out the door, "Thank you, Kiku. I know you – you couldn't say an offensive thing to a mass-murderer. I understand it must've been quite hard for you to tell me that. Thank you for worrying about me. I think, because you've tried so hard with me, I have to tell you something in return.2

"And what is that?"

"Be careful with Lars, Kiku."

The Japanese boy stayed silent for a moment, and then turned to meet Ludwig's eyes, "I don't know what you're talking about, Ludwig-san. I appreciate your concern, but thankfully it is not needed. I'll see you in form tomorrow."

"Kiku," Ludwig called him back with a sigh, "I'm _worried_ about you."

Kiku's expression hardened, "And I'm telling you there is nothing to worry about, Ludwig-san. Goodbye."

As soon as Kiku had said that, he was out of the door and down the corridor before Ludwig had chance to reply – that was probably his plan. Ludwig sighed, burying his face in his hands. It really did feel like their trio was crumbling away, and that thought made Ludwig want to crawl up into his bed and not come out again.

* * *

"Right class! Today we're starting a module that I think you will all find very interesting, aru," the classes teacher, Professor Wang clapped his hands together, and then spun on his feet to face the whiteboard, and spelt out a word in huge letters, saying each letter aloud as he went, "Astronomy!"

There was a little ripple throughout the class at that moment. In normal schools, if you showed any appreciation for science then you'd instantly be given the labels of 'geek', 'nerd', or 'teachers pet', everyone at Goverek understood that just because something was cool in science, it didn't make you a loser. Here it was quite cool to be clever.

"Now, who can tell me the difference between astrono_my_, astrolo_gy_ and astrophysics, aru?" the Professor asked, knitting his fingers together as he watched the classes' hands raise, "Yes, Alfred?" he was always pleased to hear from the American.

Alfred looked down at Arthur, who nodded helpfully in reassurance, patting his leg, "Ehh, well I think astronomy is the study of stars and planets and stuff, astrology is like horoscopes and 'if Venus moves into the path of Mars then we shall all die!' sort of thing. And… is astrophysics… is that like learning about _why_ stars move, and… matter or something?"

The Professor was more than satisfied with Alfred's answer. He almost whooped for joy right there in front of everyone – he was so pleased when a student who was labelled for being a bit of a dunce, like Feliciano or Alfred, spoke up and got a question correct.

"Brilliant, Alfred!" Professor Wang could hardly contain his excitement, "Utterly great. As Alfred said, astronomy, astrology and astrophysics are all to do with stars and space. I know in the past we've looked at our Solar System, but come _on,_ that was a bit boring. Now we get to learn about the known _universe_, and I tell you, class, this can be one of the most interesting topics you'll come across. Now, I think we'll start this lesson talking about someone I think two or three people in this room," he caught Feliciano and Lovino's eyes, "Will feel very proud of," he spun again, spelling out the letters on the board as he wrote, and rubbing out a few when he spelt it wrong, "Galileo!"

Feliciano and Lovino exchanged a glace; grinning at the mention of one of their country's many icons.

"Who can tell me the story of Galileo, then?" Professor Wang looked over at Lovino and Feliciano, and sure enough, both of their hands were trying to touch the ceiling, "You two, fire away!"

After Lovino and Feliciano had gone into great detail about Galileo and his work, most of the class had stopped listening. Luckily for them, all of them already knew the whole story between the Pope and Galileo. They weren't dense. Actually, by the time they'd finished, there was only twenty minutes of the lesson left.

"Thank you there, Lovino, Feliciano!" the Professor nodded at the boys, cutting across Lovino, who'd opened his mouth to talk about Galileo's death, "Now, I want you to partner off. You and your partner will make a list of everything you remember or know about the universe. It doesn't matter if it's wrong – next lesson we'll discuss them and decide what we've missed etcetera. For homework I want you all to go and buy a star map; you'll probably be able to find one quite cheap in the astrology store in town, and label it using whatever means you wish. You can Google it, read about it, or even go outside at night and look for yourselves. I think it's safe to assume you'll all be using Google, though," the Professor smiled, "Off you go!"

The class easily split off into pairs – it was almost set into stone who paired with who, and if anyone strayed from their normal pair they'd create havoc in the class, as it would affect everyone _else's_ pairs as well. Of course, Alfred and Arthur were together.

Arthur reached out for his pen, jotting down a few things of his own on their list, "Anything you've got?"

"Yeah! They're romantic!" Alfred grinned, pleased with himself.

Arthur rolled his eyes, "I do wonder with you, sometimes. But seriously, do you have anything?"

"Maybe put something about the speed of light?" Alfred asked, "Was it… 36 billion metres per second?"

The Brit reached into his bag, typing quickly into his phone something, and then read aloud, "The speed of light is… Two hundred and ninety-nine million, seven hundred and ninety-two thousand, four hundred and fifty-eight metres per second." Arthur concluded, taking a deep breath, and began scribbling the numbers down.

"Whatever, I was close." Alfred grinned, watching Arthur as he scribbled down the figures.

"Mr. Kirkland, as much as I admire your efforts to impress by writing down the speed of light, I do remember asking you two write down what you _remember_, and I'm pretty sure using your Smartphone to help you isn't really _remembering_. But nice idea."

The two boys wheeled around to see that Professor Wang was standing behind them, smiling all too pleasantly down at them, and he'd obviously seen the entire thing. Arthur sighed, neatly crossing off the string of numbers he'd copied down, muttering an apology under his breath.

"Not to worry, Arthur. And, Alfred, you should have a little more confidence in yourself. You're good at science, no matter what you think. Try answering a few more questions; no one's going to think you're stupid if you get it wrong," the Professor paused, hearing what he just said, "No, well, people might laugh, but we all know it's only banter. Really, Alfred, I think you could go quite far in a science-related career."

Alfred was taken aback at the sudden compliments he was receiving from their Chinese teacher. It seemed Arthur was quite surprised as well, "Ehh… Thank you, Professor. But I think I have my hopes pinned in another area."

"Oh? You do?"

"Well… I don't really know yet," Alfred shrugged, "I just don't think science is for me."

"You'd be surprised, Alfred. Science is everywhere around you, so you could argue that science is for _everyone_," Professor Wang smiled, "Just have a think. I'll talk to you boys later."

And he simply walked back over to his desk, beginning to mark some papers. Arthur and Alfred were both looking at each other, matching expressions of 'I wonder why that happened'.

"Nice one, though," Arthur said, smiling, "I always told you that you were good at science."

Alfred grinned, "Thanks, Artie!" he then sighed deeply, "I don't want to think about what to study in collage… it's _scary!_ I don't want to decide my future right _now_… I'm fourteen!"

"Scary thought, isn't it? We're going to be fifteen this year…" Arthur could remember having this conversation many times, "Before we know it we'll be out in collage, living in our own apartments…"

"Well, you'll be living with me, so that's no problem!" Alfred grinned, winking.

Before Arthur had chance to reply, the bell had rung, and everyone was clambering up from their seats to go to their next lessons. Antonio was at the front of the class talking with Professor Wang, which annoyed Arthur a little – the Brit had wanted a word with Professor about collages and the future. But he could try again later, hopefully. Now he'd have to face another lesson without Alfred by his side to make it better. How _fun_.

* * *

Alastair was pissed off with the world.

_Seriously_ pissed off with the world.

It felt like _everyone_ was out to destroy every little happy thing he had. Over the past year, he'd dated countless girls, and he was not ashamed to admit that he couldn't even remember most of their names while they were dating, let alone _now_. Of course, Elizabeth had come into the equation quite a few times, and ended with fiery arguments and smashing objects every time. Though, when Alastair claimed to have dated countless girls, he hadn't really _dated_ them. More spoken to them, kissed them, gotten laid, and left in the morning before they woke up. It was almost becoming a _burden_ these days. God what was the world _coming_ to? Sex – a _burden?_ Did he seriously just _think_ that?

Though he had to admit to himself that it _was_ true. With a sad jolt, Alastair realised he was starting to become scarily like his father. A new woman in his bed every night, getting drunk without an excuse and smoking endlessly. Well, he was nearly sixteen. That was his excuse, though it really was a lame one.

Since Owain had begun dating Francis, Alastair had found himself becoming quite close with the Bad Touch Trio. Initially he'd strengthened his friendship with the three idiots to try and spy on Francis to make sure he wasn't planning on doing anything sick to Owain. Though, after nearly a year of tagging along with the three (Alastair had begun this mission just after Daniel and Ivy's failed wedding) he could unfortunately admit that every time Francis spoke of his 'beloved little Owain' they were the sweetest, sickening, sugar-coated words of utter _adoration_ for the Welsh boy. Alastair wanted to bite his own tongue off before admitting it, but Francis was a pretty good boyfriend.

Luckily his infiltration of the trio hadn't been completely wasteful. Alastair had been reminded of Gilbert, the guy who for years he'd called his best friend. They'd known each other briefly before joining Goverek, and had been pretty inseparable before Alastair had been forced to repeat year seven for skipping too many classes. After that, Alastair and Gilbert had drifted off in their own directions, and, although they still grinned at each other, they never really _hung out_. Now though that'd changed. The two were like they had been, only with the addition of slow, but likable Antonio and the not-as-bad-as-he'd-thought Francis.

The trio with the addition of Alastair were currently on the field, like usual, smoking, like usual, and swearing, like usual. It comforted Alastair a little to be around people that he could actually relate to, though it did kind of depress him that these guys were all in pretty stable relationships.

That reminded him… "Hey Gil, I heard Matthew was getting pretty pissed at how much time you've been spending around Héderváry…"

Gilbert sighed, closing his eyes patiently, "I've _told_ him – my dad asked me to make sure she was okay with the pregnancy and stuff… You know what she's like; she's got the strength and idiocy of a guy, and if she's not careful she's going to kill herself _and_ that baby. Edelstein's 'too much of a gentleman' to actually say anything, even though he's the fucking _father_, so apparently now it's up to _me_ to make sure she doesn't go hiking up a mountain or whatever. Matthew's just worried that I'm cheating on him, which is the _stupidest_ idea in the world. It was pretty cute at first, but for God's sake – does he really think I'm going to cheat on him _with a teacher?_"

Alastair rolled his eyes, "Don't worry, mate, I'm sure he'll lighten up soon, right? Why don't you take him with you when you go to check on her to prove that you're not doing anything?"

"I suggested that, he flatly refused. He hasn't actually accused me of cheating, but I _know_ he's thinking of it. He's been _really_ cold recently. I really am kinda worried about him…" Gilbert sighed, "I was worried he might… y'know… try and get his own back?" no one noticed Francis stiffening, "I tried asking him about it, and he got all tearful, accusing me of having _trust issues_."

"Man that is _rich!"_ Alastair laughed in disbelief, "He needs to get his act together…"

"I don't like this weird feeling I have with him at the minute. It's like we're not comfortable around each other, like we're both hiding something big from each other, though I know full well that I'm not hiding anything, and I don't think Matthew's the type to cheat, right? He's just so innocent."

Alastair shrugged, "It's usually the innocent ones that turn out to be slags."

"Ah, man, that's with _girls_, that's different," Gilbert said.

"Matthew _looks_ like a girl, so what's the difference?" Alastair smirked, ignoring Gilbert's rough shove, "So how's Lovino been, Antonio?"

Antonio beamed, looking up from his iPod where he'd been desperately trying to break the high score on an app, "He's been great! We're great! Actually… I think we're _better_ than great! I think I can actually say that he's finally comfortable around me, which is always a positive. I'm taking him on a secret date at the weekend!" Antonio tapped his nose childishly, way too pleased with myself.

"Who'd have thought it…? Antonio and Lovino are pretty much the _only two_ whose relationship hadn't crashed pathetically!" Alastair scoffed, expressing his disbelief of the phenomenon.

"Hey! My relationship has not '_crashed pathetically'_ thank you very much!" Gilbert frowned.

"And I can assure you Owain and I am closer to 'soaring impressively' rather than 'crashing pathetically' as much as you'd like for the latter to happen. But no fear, _mon cher,_ I am taking perfect care of your beloved brother." Francis drawled in such a way that Alastair couldn't be too sure if the guy was gloating or not. Trusting Francis, he probably was.

"He's not my 'beloved brother', idiot. He's just my brother…" Alastair frowned, gritting his teeth.

Francis sighed, "You know Alastair, and he still _cares_ about you. You've been acting like just because I'm dating him you can't even _see_ him. But I can assure you, Owain is missing you an awful lot. He talks about you at least once a day. He's constantly worrying about you having to repeat yet another year. Just _talk_ to him - you know I'm fine with that! Hell I'd be fine if you hugged and held hands like you used to!"

"No. It's weird." Alastair decided stonily.

"You didn't seem to think that a while ago…" Gilbert muttered, though not meanly, he was simply trying to help Alastair.

"You know, Feliciano and Lovino are really cute when they're together…" Antonio said almost as a side thought, "Feli won't stop hugging Lovi! But everyone knows that that's _fine_ – they're brothers, and they love each other, so why can't they show everyone they love each other? It's perfectly normal! It doesn't _have_ to be weird…"

The other three paused to think about Antonio's words, Gilbert and Francis nodding in agreement.

There was no shifting Alastair, though, "Nope. I can't believe I'm saying this, but Francis, you're good for him. If anything I just pulled him down. At least you can 'soar impressively' with him," Alastair shook his head, standing up, "I'm going over to Coverack to see if I can score with Elizabeth… I need to get some stress-relief."

"Do you _want_ a black eye?" Antonio asked, grinning.

"I don't fancy having another food war with them either. Look what it got us last time – a new head teacher! I'm quite happy with my dad being at the top, thanks," Gilbert rolled his eyes almost fondly.

Alastair frowned, "Oh shut it, you idiots. I'll see you later."

"Don't kill yourself!" the three called after him, practically rolling about in childish giggles when Alastair shot back a stream of multiple swear words at them. When the Scot had gone, the three sighed.

"He's a case…" Gilbert muttered, "One of these days he's gunna fucking kill himself, isn't he?" Gilbert was only half-serious about his accusation.

"If he doesn't do it deliberately it'll be with his drug intake…" Francis sighed, "It'd be a pain if Owain was too depressed to kiss. Maybe we should do something about it…"

The three paused for a moment.

"Maybe later." They all said at once, grinning at each other when they realised just how in-sync they really were.

**A/N**

**Sorry about the wait ._. I really don't like this chapter! Nothing happpppensssssss. :c but that'll change soon hopefully!  
Before I forget (I know I did last time ._.") Thank you very much to those of you who've given me help with my 'how do I kill a relationship' question XD your answers are really, really helpful! Luckily, with the addition of you guys, I remembered that my two best friends are dating two guys (yeah. I _forgot_ that. Idk how.) so I've realised that I can use them for a little 'research' so hopefully the character's reactions will be more realistic and we'll get new material rather than my cliché-stealing usual stuff XD well… I can't guarantee anything…  
So I have many plans for pretty much all the characters :3 those of you who've been wanting him, Russia probably will make a more main appearance. Probably some China/Russia (Idk what you call that pairing) Don't hate me, but I really don't like Russia, so if I don't write him well, I'm terribly sorry ._." and I AM thinking of including the Nordics, and I have been for a while… I'm just not sure… _how_. X'D again, suggestions are welcome!  
And, just out of curiosity, where do you think I'm heading with the storyline? I really do want to know XD  
So thank you for reviews/follows/faves etc. :'3 they're welcomed and appreciated, and I will be sending you all invisible mint bunnies! 8D  
Byebye!**


	4. Façade

**Chapter four – Façade**

"Lovino!" Antonio called, waving his arms about excitedly, "Lovino, Lovino, Lovino!"

"For fuck's sake, calm _down!_ What is it, Toni?" Lovino looked up from a book he was revising from. Recently he'd taken to wearing a pair of reading glasses, as Antonio had seemed to be very fond of them. The thing that made Lovino blush was that his eyesight was _perfect_, and now he couldn't escape from the fact that he was basically giving Antonio fanservice.

"I have an idea!" Antonio cried happily, "An idea for a date! I've planned it super, super carefully. You're going to _love_ it!"

Lovino smiled weakly, then realised, "Hey, it was my turn to organise and pay for this date! You'd better not be stealing that privilege away from me; I can pay for things myself, you know," Lovino didn't care that it was sad – he and Antonio _took dates in turn_. It really did feel like they were turning into an old married couple. Luckily though, this old married couple weren't the arguable type, they were the loveable old married couple. Though sometimes Lovino wasn't quite sure which was worse.

Antonio pouted a little, "But this date is a once in a… long time chance!" the poor Spaniard couldn't remember just how rare the thing he was showing Lovino was, "Whatever it is, _it's exciting!_ Come on, get your bag, you cute little thing, we're going!"

"What, _now?"_ Lovino asked, retraining Antonio's pulling on his wrist just long enough to dog-ear his page in the book, and fold his glasses up on top of the book, before Antonio yanked Antonio through to their bedroom, throwing things at him.

"You'll _probably_ want some money, and you might want some food, though I'll make we stop off for coffee, too! And it might get chilly, so I'd put that _adorable_ scarf of yours on, too!" Antonio chirruped, very pleased with himself as he located each item he thought of without problem and handed them swiftly to Lovino, who held them dumbly, still not entirely sure what was going on.

"Toni, I need to _revise,_ I'm sorry. There's a test on Monday and I don't even know what it's about…" Lovino sighed, deliberately not looking at Antonio. Though, without realising he was doing it, Lovino suddenly found himself looking up from the floor boards of their dorm and into Antonio's emerald green gaze, and he nearly drowned in his own guilt, "Okay. But tomorrow, no kissing, no hugging, just _studying_." Lovino knew that he was going to fail the test.

Though failing the test was enough to see Antonio's reaction. It was utterly _adorable_ as he listened to Lovino's compromise, and nodded all-too-happily to what he was saying, and then, after thanking Lovino in Spanish, flung his arms around the Italian gleefully.

"I wonder how the fuck I'm meant to be the submissive one in this relationship…" Lovino muttered, throwing his favourite scarf – _Antonio hadn't given it to him, damn it_ – around his neck, putting his loose change in one of his pockets, liking the feel of it rattling in there – it made him feel rich and mature, as childish as it sounded. Then, after going through and downing a well-made espresso from Antonio, the two were down the stairs, heading their way down to the school grounds, smiling at Feliciano and Kiku as they passed, who seemed to be talking about something important.

Finally they reached the bus stop – Lovino knew without Antonio even telling him that they'd go here, after all _everyone_ did. There were no parents nearby to give lifts to their kids, and the day a teacher shipped you around like a parent might would be the day Mr. Belischmidt decided the national curriculum was too dull, and painted the entire school pink, and taught everyone how to groom unicorns. So, the only method of travel was the very cheap, very regular bus to everywhere that you might need to go, or foot. Hardly anyone chose the latter; as I'm sure you can believe.

So, Lovino sat down on a nearby wall, waiting for the bus, as Antonio muttered out a little plan that he was thinking up. Lovino would've listened in, but it was all nonsense to him, as Antonio muttered some words a loud, and must've kept others in his head, as he came out with very incomplete sentences. Either that, or Antonio was slowly turning insane. Neither would surprise Lovino.

Soon the bus arrived, thank God, and Antonio waved Lovino down, telling him to go and get a pair of seats while he paid. Lovino knew this was a very clever tactic in two ways – it ensured that Lovino didn't pay for his _own_ ticket, and that he didn't find out the location they were going to.

Sadly, the bus was quite packed. There was one pair of seats left, and they were near the back. Lovino thought it was 'sadly' because that meant that he and Antonio probably couldn't get away with kissing and hand holding like they usually might if there was only a little girl and her mum sitting on the bus. But with there seeming to be an army of old women – a few of whom Lovino could've sworn he'd been told off by for 'showing affection publicly' before – it would probably offend more people than it'd make swoon.

Antonio, of course, was oblivious to these subtle little signs, and proudly took Lovino's hand, lacing their fingers together. Lovino was quite flattered by the motion – he _loved _it when they held hands. But shh. – though that didn't stop him shoving Antonio away from him when the Spaniard began placing little pecks to his cheek and neck.

"Toni, I love you and everything, but not in here," Lovino sighed, ruffling Antonio's hair as he gently pushed him away.

Antonio frowned, "But _why?_ I really look out to our bus-make-out-sessions," oh God he'd even christened them, "Please, Lovi?"

"No! Usually I'd agree…" he hissed, hoping no one could hear them, "… but there are _people_ here today, and I think we might offend some of them!"

Antonio blinked, "When have _you_ been worried about offending people?"

"No, no, I don't give a damn what they think – I just want to spare my pride from being shattered by being lectured by a granny I don't even know in the middle of public." Lovino sighed, squeezing Antonio's hand a little, "Later, yeah?"

"Okay…" Antonio smiled, and leant gently against Lovino's shoulder, closing his eyes, "Is this okay?"

"Yes, that's fine. But don't fall asleep, because I have no idea where we're going, and you need to press that stop button…" Lovino carried on with his worried rambles.

"Yes, yes, _mi amour_, don't' worry," Antonio assured him, smiling as he felt Lovino shift slightly, to rest his head on top of Antonio's. It was extremely hard not to fall asleep in such a natural, comfy position.

* * *

"A _train?"_

"Yes!"

"We're taking _a train?_ Okay, it's official. We're going to get lost in the middle of England somewhere, and we're just going to _die_. Thank you, Antonio, I love you too." Lovino sighed, burying his face in his hands.

"Don't' worry, Lovi! I've got all the tickets and everything, so all we need to do is go to the platforms and hope a train comes!" Antonio waved two orange pieces of card about, very nearly dropping one.

Lovino sighed, rescuing the pieces of paper from Antonio's grasp, pocketing them, "Come on… platform four was it? We're going to be late if we don't hurry up. Why're you taking me on _a train?"_

"Because it's hard to get where I want to go without a train! It was either train, miles of walking, or changing from bus station to bus station."

Lovino pouted, it did seem most likely to get lost by walking or changing bus stops. Perhaps Antonio had been right on the train front.

They quickly found platform four. To the pair's dismay, they saw that the platform was quite crowded, which would probably mean they'd only get quite public seats, which would also mean that they probably wouldn't get their 'public-transport-make-out-session' as Antonio had re-named it. Lovino didn't want to admit it, but he'd been looking forward to it just as much as Antonio was.

Soon the train arrived, and the pair realised with crushing dismay that the seats were only in groups of four – there were no single two seats anywhere, which was extremely stupid in Lovino's opinion – so that would mean they'd probably have to sit opposite two complete strangers.

Luckily, it seemed Lovino's rough scowl and the fact Antonio was proudly handing on to Lovino's hand seemed to put people off sitting by them, so they were on their own on in the little booth of seats, sitting next to each other, with the two empty seats opposite. The train was by no means pretty or a nice place to sit – it resembled the trains you found in the London underground, yet still grubbier. It definitely looked more like a bus than a train.

Across the rows from them, four girls were sitting in their own booth of seats, all twittering pointless crap about boys and how they hated girls that were prettier than them – or that's all Lovino heard. Both Antonio and Lovino decided they'd probably draw unwanted attention to themselves if they suddenly started kissing, so keeping their hands secretly connected, trapped between their thighs, the two just sat there, not saying or doing anything, so Lovino decided to reach his iPod out, and tucked a headphone into his own ear, and then the other into Antonio's, blasting My Chemical Romance through the buds.

Antonio was happily off in a world of his own, planning out every stage of the date in his head. He was really quite pleased with himself for thinking up the idea. Though he wished that he could've arranged it for Sunday, as then they might've got a bit more peace and quiet.

Speaking of peace and quiet, the girls across from him and Lovino were really starting to get annoying, and Antonio never usually got annoyed at things. It made his teeth grind together at how _dense_ they sounded. They'd been discussing the Eurostar train from London to Calais, the one girl who'd obviously been on the journey was describing it, while one of her friends chipped in, saying '_Hang on… you do know there's _water_ in between London and France, don't you!'_ to which her friends had replied '_yeah – it goes underwater, it's clever isn't it?_' Antonio had nearly jumped out of the train they were so depressingly stupid.

Lovino also seemed to be getting agitated at the girl's stupidity from across him, as Antonio could hear the very quiet yet very sinister sound of the boy's teeth grinding together menacingly. Antonio couldn't help but smile a bit.

Then he heard the girls say something that made his blood boil a little bit.

"Hey," one blonde girl tapped another beside her, "That guy there," she pointed at Lovino very obviously, "He's cute, isn't he?"

The girl who Blondie had poked looked up – she had bright ginger hair, "Oh my god you're right! Though I think he's taken." Ginger winked, pointing at Antonio. Lovino and Antonio had to try very hard to resist the urge to scream at them, telling them that they _weren't_ the only people on the train, and that people _did_ have ears.

Blondie grinned at Ginger, and then caught the attention of the girl opposite her; a girl with pretty brown hair, "Hey, those guys there – gay or straight?"

Brunette studied Lovino and Antonio very obviously, narrowing her eyes with thought, "Hm… I think the one on the left," she pointed to Antonio, "Has a thing for the one on the right, but the one on the right's got a girlfriend. Or a boyfriend."

The final girl, a girl with jet black hair interrupted her friends, "Or you could just ask them yourself rather than talking _extremely_ loudly?"

Blondie, Ginger and Brunette all exchanged looks, and then a second or two later, Lovino and Antonio found that the two seats opposite were being taken by Blondie and Ginger, both of them grinning obliviously.

"So, are you two…" Ginger asked, pausing to blush a little, "Like, _gay_?"

Lovino had to resist the urge to punch them, trying to remind himself that he'd probably be locked up if he hit a girl in public.

"Yes!"

"No."

Antonio and Lovino both answered at the same time, and then frowned at one another when they saw the other had answered the wrong answer to what they'd intended. Of course Antonio had said the positive.

"I told you." Jet Black called over from a magazine she was now reading.

"Loviiii~" Antonio pouted, now playing on the 'adorable gay guy image' that he knew made people melt, "You said you loved me!"

Ginger and Blondie were definitely falling for his act.

Lovino smirked inwardly. He may as well have a little fun. It might be his only opportunity to have a more dominant part in their relationship for a while. So, with a confident snarl of a smile, he ran a finger up Antonio's throat, "Ah, but I told you not to tell anyone about that…"

Ginger and Blondie were nearly dying from loss of blood.

"But I want you to say it to me _now…_" Antonio begged, enjoying his submissive act.

Lovino moved over to Antonio's ear, though made sure it was the side the girls could see, and whispered very lowly, "_Ti amo…_" and then snaked out his tongue, nibbling a little on the top of his ear. He could feel Antonio shudder at the pleasure.

The pair looked up, and were shocked at how Kiku-esque the girls looked right now; bright red in the face, itching to say something, though not entirely sure _what_ they should say, and tense hands that looked like they wanted to grope something – most probably the shutter button of a camera. Perhaps he and Antonio should go into acting, Lovino thought slyly.

"O-Okay… Thank you!" Ginger said, the politest she'd been the whole journey. Her and Blondie quickly scampered back over to Brunette and Jet Black, both of whom looked extremely disinterested at what had just happened.

"You make a very sexy submissive, you know…" Lovino muttered, just loud enough for Antonio to hear.

Antonio looked ready to double up into giggles, "Where did _that_ come from? Since when have you been such a flirt?"

Lovino was torn between blushing and smirking. Whatever had taken over him today, it made the smirk appear, "Well, let's just say I'm feeling a little deprived from my physical love towards you. I haven't had a kiss from you for over an hour…"

Antonio grinned hungrily, "Well, we've already made a public display. I don't think they'll mind if they see another, do you?"

"Not at all…" Lovino winked, and before Antonio could say or do anything else, the little Italian had captured the Spaniard's lips in his own, and they kissed their hearts content out, not caring about the tuts of disgust from people around them, or the flashing of cameras.

They even didn't care when they came to their station.

Well, they were mid kiss and the doors opened, and they realised with a hurry that they needed to get off. So, with a few second extension of their kiss, they grabbed their stuff, and just made it out of the doors before they slid powerfully shut behind them. The two nearly collapsed into giggles at the fact that people had been _taking pictures_ of them. It seemed absurd!

For once, Lovino actually didn't care about showing his affection for Antonio. He was sure this free feeling wouldn't last, as he had no idea why he was feeling so juvenile and innocent, but in some ways he wished it'd stay with him forever, as it felt nice to give back to Antonio what the Spaniard had been giving him ever since they'd met.

The place Antonio had taken them was a small town called Boscastle. It wasn't too far from Padstow, and was apparently quite famous for being an area prone to flooding. Boscastle wasn't much bigger than Padstow, though the change of scenery was refreshing. Finally Lovino wouldn't have to put up with walking on the same cobbled path, seeing the same boats, the same shop keepers, the same grey clouds in the sky. At least this place had a different cobbled path, different boats and different shop keepers and different grey clouds. Though Lovino still wasn't quite sure why he'd been dragged all the way out to _Boscastle_ by Antonio – they'd passed at least three seaside towns on their way to their destination, so why _here?_

Antonio didn't give any explanation for his choice of location, and just went around, holding Lovino's hand proudly and grinning brightly. Well, Lovino thought, if he's not going to tell me what we're doing here, then he may as well just play along.

* * *

Francis wanted to rip his own throat out. He had no idea what he was doing with his life. The door he stood staring at looked like a scarily inviting place to bash his head against until he killed every brain cell in his head. He felt like an _utter_ bastard to too many people. Hell, he was even feeling remorse for _Arthur_, so either he was slowly going insane, or he really had fucked up.

But still, with _all_ this knowledge in his brain, all screaming at him to leave, he still knocked on the door in front of him. He lowered his now shaking hand, biting the inside of his cheek as the door creaked open, and there stood Matthew in the door.

"Come in quickly. Hurry up before someone sees you…" Matthew muttered, practically dragging Francis inside.

Francis hated himself for the flirtatious grin he flashed Matthew, "What can I do for you, _mon cher?_ I assumed you called me here for a reason?" Francis decided to play dumb – it would probably be for the best. Of course he knew exactly why Matthew had called him there; it had been the reason why he'd both been lured there and been terrified of going there.

Matthew frowned, knowing full well that Francis knew the reason, "Don't play stupid," Matthew chewed on his lip, and then with an awkward little cough, he closed his eyes. When he opened them again there was an odd look of determination in his purple-blue orbs.

The Canadian walked forward very confidently, grabbing Francis' bright red tie hanging loosely that he'd chosen to go with his designer shirt. Using the tie as a makeshift sort of leash, Matthew gritted his teeth, and with a deep breath pulled Francis towards him, crashing their lips together.

Francis knew that by walking into this room he'd sealed his fate. He knew it, and he'd walked right in, flirtatious grin and all. He'd avoided Matthew's invitations to 'help with his French homework' for weeks now. Matthew had _wanted_ this, and he was getting it, no matter how many people he hurt, apparently. Francis felt terrible. This wasn't the first time he'd shared a kiss with Matthew without Owain knowing. At the beginning of summer, while Owain had been away visiting his mother, and Gilbert with his family, both Francis and Matthew had had a little 'summer fling' as they'd called it.

Francis had gotten over it quite quickly; of course he'd felt terrible, and confessed to Owain. The Welsh boy had blown it off, just smiling and saying 'it was inevitable when dating someone with such good looks' though Francis could see the broken side to the strong smile Owain put on. Francis knew full well that if Owain found out about this 'little fling' he'd be a little more than devastated. Either he had to stop it _right now_, lie to Owain, or tell him and risk breaking up with him.

Francis didn't move.

Why the _hell_ was his brain deciding the first option? He didn't want this! Or that's what he was telling himself, though even the rational side of him couldn't deny that it felt amazing when Matthew pulled away from his lips and began sucking on the hollow just below his ear under his jaw. Matthew had learnt some pretty sexy strategies from Gilbert.

No! This is _not _what he wanted! And if he _did_ want this, then _he'd_ be dominant, thank you very much!

Mentally gouging his eyes out, Francis gently took Matthew's lips away from his own neck, and trapped them in his own, sliding his tongue inside Matthew's shocked little mouth, easily gaining control of the kiss.

"If we're going to do this, we may as well do it well, _non?_ Are you sure you want to do this to Gilbert?" Francis asked nonchalantly, hiding his own fear and self-hatred easily with his usual façade.

"I want to hurt him." Matthew practically _snarled_, and let Francis take over on the kissing front.

"Very well, _mon cher_. Though if someone finds out about all of this I'm blaming it on you…" Francis muttered into his ear.

"Oh God, I don't' give a fuck." Matthew muttered uncharacteristically, and just let himself be taken over by Francis' perfect, sexy kisses.

Now Francis really understood why he was frequently described as a dick.

**A/N**

**OOOH. Plot twist. That I'm sure most of you saw coming. Oh Francis, how could you do this?  
Yeah, I'm jumping on the 'let's-make-Matty-an-innocent(?)-slut!' bandwagon! What can I say? I hold a grudge against a Canadian for being a dick to my best friend, so all my hatred for him comes out here! And I'm not saying I dislike anyone because they're Canadian! D: I'm not racist! I swear!  
And we will revisit the end of Lovi and Toni's date X'D Don't worry ^^ I think I'm kinda bad for leaving things mid-scene X'D I'll try to stop doing that ._.  
Also, I'm starting to writ an Avengers fic (yaaay!) But I won't let it interfere with this ^^ I think I'll post it up when I have it all written, rather than making you wait extra-long if your reading both this fic and that fic.  
I don't know what I'm talking about X'D  
So reviews are love, sweetie pies! :D Thank you to you guys who told me Russia/China was called RoChu ^^ /feels like a bit of a noob/ WOOP! I'm learning things!  
So that, and hopefully some 'hot Nordic action (lol)' shall be on it's way to a website near you soon! First I have to figure out what to do with them…  
I'm out, people!**


	5. Acquaintances

**Chapter five – Acquaintances**

Lovino and Antonio's date was going surprisingly well. Antonio had managed to keep the date exciting and interesting, despite the fact they'd probably gone to one of the most boring, depressing towns in the UK. The two of them had tried their luck with fishing, visited a little market on the outskirts of the town, where Lovino had his fortune told by a very beautiful gypsy woman, and even dragged their feet up a very, very steep hill.

By the time they'd begun their miniature hiking session, the sun was already partly behind the horizon. Lovino was very thankful that Antonio didn't say something stupidly cliché involving the quite beautiful sunset (Lovino _never_ admitted that something was beautiful.) Instead, the Spaniard was uncharacteristically quiet from behind Lovino as they climbed their way up the large hill. Antonio was so quiet that he was actually starting to worry Lovino a little.

"Hey, are you okay?" Lovino asked quietly, turning around and almost tripping over a rock due to his lack of concentration.

Antonio chuckled, steadying Lovino with his hands, "I'm fine, _mi amor, _I'm with you after all!"

Lovino rolled his eyes, "Yeah, yeah, whatever. You're just being a bit quiet."

"Oh? What's this? Is Lovino _worried_ about me?" Antonio giggled, both happy and genuinely taken aback.

"Shut the fuck up, idiot. You're my boyfriend; I'm allowed to worry about you."

Antonio looked about ready to explode with happiness at Lovino's very simple fourteen words, "Lovi! That's so nice!" Antonio flung his arms around Lovino, causing both of them to crash on to the grassy floor, both giggling and a little out of breath. Of course, if Lovino ever retold the story – which he probably _wouldn't_ – he would leave out the part of _him_ giggling. He had some dignity, after all.

Their giggling soon stopped, the two of them staying silent. Like most silences between lovers, the silence wasn't awkward, just peaceful. They lay there, almost hugging, staring into each other's eyes. Lovino hated himself for letting Antonio act so cliché. He _hated_ clichés. Well, actually if he was completely honest with himself, he _wanted_ to hate clichés, but whenever he found himself in a romantic situation like that, he couldn't help but secretly love it. Hell, his heart felt like it was about to take off out of his chest!

"Lovino, this is the surprise I wanted you to see," Antonio smiled, stroking Lovino's cheek a little. By now, the sun had settled behind the horizon, and the dusk of the evening had begun to settle around them, the air becoming a little cooler, and a few stars becoming visible. It was an incredibly clear night.

"I love the starts…" Lovino muttered under his breath, not actually meaning to say anything, "They're just like beacons of hope. Like even if we destroy this planet, then hopefully on some other big star or planet, they'll have a better shot at their lives. If aliens exist or whatever."

Antonio smiled, it was refreshing for Lovino to be so honest. He didn't say anything, though, as he knew that Lovino was probably just _thinking_ that, and was so relaxed, he'd accidentally say it. Antonio knew that if he made it obvious that he'd heard Lovino's mutters, then Lovino would become very guarded, and it'd be even harder for Antonio to find out what was going on with Lovino's beautiful, refreshing thoughts.

"Jesus, what was that!?" Lovino gasped, pointing up at the sky. Antonio looked up, smiling, knowing exactly what Lovino had just seen, even though the sky was now empty from anything that could've startled Lovino.

"What was it Lovi? I wasn't looking…" Antonio smiled.

Lovino frowned, "Nothing. What date is it today?"

"27th September, Lovi~" Antonio smiled, knowing full well what Lovino was doing.

"_Shit!_ That was good timing, Toni! There's meant to be a pretty impressive meteor shower tonight!" Lovino's eyes widened, a grin spreading across his face, "So… I _did_ just see a shooting star! Fuck, I thought I was hallucinating…" as if to reassure Lovino that he wasn't going insane, another few lights streaked across the sky scarily fast.

"I know it was good timing," Antonio smiled, tiling his head to his side and propping his head up on his hand.

Lovino stared at Antonio, "You planned this?"

"Course I did!" Antonio was pleased with himself, "I know how much you love the stars, Lovi, and you've wanted to see a meteor shower for ages! I figured I'd talk to Professor Wang about it, and he told me that this was probably one of the best places to view them, especially if it was a clear night."

Lovino didn't care about dignity any more. He flung himself on to Antonio, missing an impressive little group of comets up in the sky as he kissed the sense out of Antonio. Fuck hating clichés – they were fucking _romantic_.

"I knew you'd be happy, but I didn't think you'd be _this_ happy! I must try harder to make this happen more often… you've been awfully loving today… I've quite enjoyed this side of you…" Antonio chuckled, "But look, you're missing the meteors. I know you'll kick yourself later if you miss this chance. Just think, we can kiss all you want later. Right now just fall into the night sky."

Lovino knew that with Antonio's promise of endless kissing later on, he would never be able to concentrate probably. Right now all he wanted was to love Antonio for all he was worth. Though Antonio was right. There were meteors to watch.

Luckily for Lovino, the meteors were beautiful enough to distract anyone from anything. Maybe this was the key to World peace – just let everyone see the universe for how beautiful it was, and then everyone would understand just how precious their World was.

Would it be too cliché to say that Antonio is my world? Lovino thought to himself.

Fuck it. He was already sitting on a hill, holding hands with his boyfriend on a hill looking up at the stars. You couldn't get much more cliché than that, so why not go the whole hog?

"Antonio," Lovino muttered, "Thank you for this…" he paused before saying what he wanted too, taking a deep breath, "Some people let their lives revolve around themselves, or their work, or helping other people… I think they're wasting their lives doing that – what do they gain at the end of it all? They'll just _die_, no matter what happens. Life's kinda pointless when you think of it like that," fuck – he was getting too deep! "B-But I'm not like that. My life revolves around something very, very special. Something I couldn't live without. Something that makes me smile, even when I'm so pissed off I want to kill someone."

Antonio smiled at Lovino's honesty, "And what's that, Lovi?"

Lovino looked quickly down at the floor, feeling his face flush crimson as he locked gazes with Antonio, "Y-You."

Antonio nearly rolled over squealing at Lovino's utter adorable-ness. Instead, he composed himself, and confidently leaned over, pressing a chaste kiss to Lovino's lips, smiling slightly at the little girly 'yeep' of surprise Lovino whispred at the sudden kiss.

"Lovino, you know I tell you every morning that I love you?"

"Yes?"

"Well, think about every time I've said that to you. Combine them all together, add all the stars we can see right now, and times it all by twenty," Antonio said.

"What're you getting at?" Lovino pouted, not sure if he was glad about his honesty.

"Well that's not even close to how much I love you right now." Antonio declared.

"Soppy bastard…" Lovino muttered, but let Antonio kiss him, both of them forgetting about the beautiful shower around them. If anyone had walked over to see Lovino and Antonio, they'd probably melt at how perfect the scene looked. They really were made for each other.

PAGE BREAK HERE

Arthur's German class on Monday was a lot different to last Monday's.

First of all to make it unique, Mr. Belischmidt wasn't teaching. Instead of their Headmaster, there was a tall man with very messy blonde hair standing at the front of their class. His hair actually reminded Arthur of his own, as the colour was very similar and the thickness almost identical, though this man had chosen to make it look like an electric current had been passed through his body. His hair was _everywhere!_ Staying with the subject of electricity, his eyes sparkled a dangerous, electric blue, and gave him the look of a curious seven year old, which'd just discovered they could terrorise their siblings by pulling their hair, or tickling them. Then there was his determined grin. Well, that grin almost needed a paragraph of its own; it was just so _confident_. Arthur wasn't entirely quite sure why some random guy standing at the front of their class had so much confidence – what was he even doing there?

"Right, right, sit down class!" the man called, his expression staying as wild as ever, "Is everyone here? God there's not many of you! I have some news –it might be exciting or not, depending on your views. But, as I'm sure Mr. Belischmidt will tell you in your next assembly, he's decided to do something about your kinda sucky teaching methods. Remember before you had a load of teachers doubling up on lessons? Well, he's fixed that! So now, I am your new German teacher!"

There were mutters from the boys, each giving a few words of their approval or disapproval. Arthur found himself sitting next to Kiku for this lesson (why wasn't he sitting with Ludwig and Feliciano?) and, as Kiku was so uptight about not talking about people behind their backs, let alone right in front of them, Arthur didn't get to express his opinion of this new teacher. His opinion was, in his own words 'mildly curious, a little intimidated, and generally wishing Mr. Belischmidt was back.'

"Yeah, yeah, that's enough talking about me! Don't judge people, kids, it's not a nice thing to do," the man glared playfully, "I am Mathias Køhler, newly shipped in from the great Denmark itself! Now, I know what you might be thinking," he cleared his throat, and then spoke in a very high pitched, childish voice – obviously doing a scarily accurate impression of any member of the class, "'But if your from Denmark, why are you teaching German?'" he waved his arms about a bit, and then returned to his usual voice, "Well, kids, I _studied_. And I'm here to pass on that studying to you. I can speak German as well as the next German you see. I'm fluent, 'cause I had an awesome teacher in school, so now I'm going to be an awesome teacher for you!"

At the use of the word 'awesome', everyone looked around at Gilbert. They all knew that Gilbert would either get along _very_ well with Mr. Køhler, or by the end of the lesson, the German would be ready to rip out the man's throat. By the looks of things right now, it seemed he might have to be restrained, as the second option looked scarily close to coming true.

"So guys, you know me, so I want to know you. But not really about you – I'm your teacher, not your roommate. I want to know how good at German you are, so I've prepared a short test for you. Don't worry if you don't know some of the answers; there's some really, _really_ easy stuff, and some really, _really_ hard stuff. I just want to know how good at the language you are, so don't worry too much about it," the man grinned, holding up a thick wad of stapled-together paper, "You," he pointed at Colin, "Can you hand these out for me, please?"

With a great sigh, Colin stumbled to his feet, and took the great mass of paper, and began throwing them at his classmates, landing neatly on their desks in front of them. This was a perfect opportunity for Arthur to find out about Kiku's odd isolation from his friends.

"Hey, Kiku, are you all right?" Arthur asked in a whisper, lightly pressing a hand to Kiku's shoulder in a comforting way.

The Japanese boy smiled a little, "Yes, yes, I'm fine, thank you, Arthur-san. There is no need to worry about me, really."

"Well I know _something's_ up – what happened between you and Ludwig?"

"How on earth did you know that?" Kiku's eyes widened, and looked like he thought Arthur had connections with the devil.

Arthur shrugged, laughing, "Well, you're not sitting with Feliciano and Ludwig, but there're spare seats by both of them. It's not possible to argue with Feliciano unless your name is Lovino, so you must've had an argument with Ludwig. What happened?"

Kiku looked about ready to christen Arthur the next Sherlock Holmes (Arthur knew his simple deduction was nothing to match up to Holmes' standards – Kiku was just easily impressed) "Ehh… well it's not an argument as such, I just had a little disagreement with Ludwig, and I'm not too sure where we stand right now."

"You can start wit your tests!" Mr. Køhler called from the front of the class, now sitting on his chair, legs propped up against his desk.

Arthur dropped his voice so as not to be accused of cheating, "What was it about?"

"Your skills can't deduce that, Arthur?" Arthur couldn't decide if Kiku was being serious or not, but he went on to explain the problem either way, "Well I told Ludwig that if he wasn't careful, he was going to start drifting from Feliciano, and Ludwig told me that Lars was dangerous." Kiku pouted childishly, "He's not _dangerous_… He's just a little intimidating!"

Arthur was shocked to see Kiku acting so out of character, "Don't worry Kiku, I'm sure Lars is a perfectly acceptable boyfriend. But ehh…" one little part of Kiku's explanation had got Arthur's curiosity grinding again, "What did you mean by Ludwig and Feliciano might 'drift apart'" he drew little quotation marks in the air with his fingers around the words.

Kiku frowned, a little confused, "Well, I meant that if Ludwig isn't careful, he might start taking Feliciano for granted, and that is probably one of the worst things you can do in a relationship."

"Go on…" Arthur muttered, starting on his test while listening.

"Well, let's say Ludwig did take Feliciano for granted. Of course, that would mean that Ludwig just accepts that he'll always have Feliciano, and it's not that he does it deliberately, it just happens. He might stop putting Feliciano first, and out other things before him. I believe that the key to a healthy relationship is to prioritise your lover before anything or anyone else. It seems right now, Ludwig is putting his work first, and that will cause them to fall apart. It's a bit like what happened with me and Heracles, but slower and more painful."

Arthur felt a chill run down his spine. He knew exactly what Kiku was talking about, and with a sickening feel of realisation, Arthur was beginning to wonder, _was that happening to him and Alfred?_

PAGE BREAK HERE

Meanwhile in Alfred's French class, the American was witnessing something very, very odd. Well actually, it was more than just one odd phenomenon.

First of all, Arthur's class hadn't been the only ones to get a new teacher. It seemed Alfred's class had acquired _two_ new teachers, as, standing at the front of the class were two blonde men standing adorably close to one another. The first had a kind smile on his face and looked relatively normal – or as normal as this school could get, anyway. He looked quite girly not only in the way he'd styled his hair neatly, but also the way he held himself. He linked his fingers together in front of him in that adorable way little girls do when they want something. On the whole, he looked like quite a nice guy, and a reasonably good teacher.

The other guy had to be the complete opposite of the first guy.

This man, as stated before, also had blonde hair, but this was short and cropped as opposed to the first man's medium-length silky locks. But the second man was the reason the entire class was silent, each student now suddenly understanding what it'd be like to sit in Death Row. This man's entire face challenged Coach Braginski's bad moods, and Coach Braginski's bad moods were _murderous_. His eyes seemed to pierce right through you and skewer your darkest secrets. He hadn't even opened his mouth yet, but some students were already imagining just how dangerous he sounded. What the hell was Mr. Belischmidt doing by employing a mass murderer for a teacher!?

Of course, no one had any _proof_ this man was the evil psychopath that everyone had decided he was in there heads, but who needs proof when someone has a face as scary as that!?

"Hello class! I am your new teacher, Tino Väinämöinen, though, as my surname is so hard to pronounce, I'd rather not waste away our lessons trying to say Finnish surnames, so you can all just call me 'sir' or 'Tino' or whatever, as long as it's not offensive!" Tino smiled happily, not mentioning anything about the evil-looking man beside him. It was making Alfred wonder if he was _imagining_ this man.

"As I'm sure you've figured out by now, Mr. Belischmidt is employing new members of staff. From what I've heard, two of my close friends have also got a job here, so that's great, no? And across the hall, there's Mr. Køhler teaching German. He's a nice enough guy, but you don't want to get on his bad side."

The evil man grunted in agreement. Everyone sat up straight suddenly, tensing up their limbs in fear.

"Now, let's do some French, shall we?" Tino smiled childishly.

"Sir," Francis stuck up his hand elegantly, "May I ask, if you are from Finland, why're you teaching French?"

Tino frowned, "I'll have you know that you don't have to be from a country to know the language! You're speaking English, aren't you? I think that's enough proof!"

Francis chuckled patronisingly, "Though wouldn't it make sense to have someone fluent teaching their own language? For instance _moi?_"

The evil man spoke for Tino.

"'F you have a probl'm with h's teaching, th'n get _out_."

Francis looked petrified, and then squeaked a very un-cool, out-of-character, "I-I'm sorry! There's no problem!"

Owain nearly keeled over laughing, but was soon shut up by a glare from the man.

"Ah! I knew I forgot something! Class, this is Berwald Oxenstierna. I'm not entirely sure why he's here today, but I think it's for moral support, isn't that nice? Don't be scared, though. He's really not as mean as he looks."

Berwald looked at Tino, knitting his eyebrows together, "What d'you mean 'n't as mean as he l'ks'?"

Tino just smiled, patting Berwald's head patronisingly as he went on to teach his lesson, "So, class, _French!_ Who can tell me what you were studying last? Hopefully I'll be able to continue where you last were. It wouldn't be too good if we repeated a lesson, or skipped a lesson…"

Alfred smiled to himself. He was definitely fond of this new teacher. He was wondering what Arthur's class was like with the new Mr. Køhler that Tino had mentioned. They all had such strange names…

"Hey," Alastair muttered, tapping Alfred's arm, narrowing his eyes.

"What're you doing here? Why aren't you sitting with Owain?" Alfred said, squinting with confusion.

Alastair ignored Alfred, pointing subtly to the front of the class at Francis, Owain, Matthew (who'd moved seats from beside Alfred for some reason) "Something's up with those lot."

"Actually I was wondering about that…" Alfred muttered, he'd noticed before that the three of them were acting quite strange, "What's going on?"

Alastair shrugged, "Dunno. But I bet you anything it has something to do with Francis."

Alfred nodded, "You're probably right…"

"Of course I'm right, you idiot."

"So what? Francis did what?" Alfred pouted with thought.

Shrugging, Alastair chewed on the end of his pen, leaning back in his seat, "No idea. Probably something perverted and _French_… though not his usual perverted – he's too… on edge for that. But not on-edge because of that fucking serial killer who's teaching us. It's something _else_. Catch my drift?"

"Yup." Alfred nodded, biting his lip, "Maybe… he had a fling?"

"It wouldn't surprise me. Owain looks pretty pissed off…" Alastair frowned, "But with _who?_"

"Gilbert?"

"Hah, that's quite possible," Alastair chuckled dryly, "Though Gilbert did tell me something the other day… I wonder…"

"What?"

"Never mind." Alastair answered quickly, "See if you can find anything out. I'll talk to Owain later."

"Tell me if you hear anything!" Alfred grinned, loving the thought of gossip. Call him a girl or whatever, but at least with gossip there was something to _talk _about rather than rolling around, bored out of his mind.

"Will do," Alastair nodded, then his eyes widened drastically as he caught Mr. Oxenstierna's eye, and the Scottish teen quickly began scribbling down on a piece of paper the date in French.

"Fuck. We're all screwed…" he muttered, knowing full well who'd be in his nightmares, and probably everyone else's, tonight.

**A/N**

**I'm sorry this took so long! X'D I'm not really sure what happened XD I just didn't get around to writing it XD  
Thank you for your lovely, lovely reviews, people! You're all little angels! My own shooting star shower XD  
I'm sorry if all that stuff about comet showers was incorrect XD I know the dates are complete crap; for some reason it was really hard to find dates that comets/meteors appear, so I just made some up XD but yay for romantic cliché! I'd do anything for a guy as sweet as Toni~  
I hope I wrote Sweden, Finland and Denmark okay Q_Q I've never read/written them before XD I don't know when/if Norway and Iceland will appear XD their personalities confuse me! If anyone has any pointers with them, then feel free to tell me! Help is much appreciated!  
Support makes me write quicker! Q¬Q so if possible, fave/follow/review if possible, and thank you if you have/will/want to XD  
Thanks you guys! **


	6. Shy to Bitches in five minutes

**Chapter six – Shy to Bitches in five minutes**

One thing about September is that you can never be sure if it's going to be warm or cold. Technically it's still summer in September, but in never really _feels_ like that. Actually, it'd been autumn for over a week in Goverek, but with the low clouds, frost in the morning, icicles lining windowsills and a chilly breeze to meet you the second you stepped outdoors, it felt more like the dead of winter. Of course, Britain being Britain, the weather was generally a lot worse than what a lot of people were used to from their home countries. Even after living on the dismal little island for years, Antonio, Feliciano, Lovino, and all the other boys who were used to their warm climates still wanted to die in the later months of the year. It was just too _cold_.

The Kirkland brothers, though, were very used to this weather. Alastair had been seen going for an early-morning jog in only a t-shirt. Ironically, no one was really bothered by him wearing a t-shirt – the thing they couldn't get over was _Alastair_ going for an _early-morning jog_. Arthur was also quite fond of the cold weather, and had a little collection of scarves and gloves he kept under his bed for such days. The twins couldn't wait for snow, as you couldn't have two mischievous twins that _didn't like snow_. Even Peter was counting down the days until Christmas, which made everyone melt a little bit inside at his cute attitude. Owain was the only one of the brothers that didn't like being in the cold. Though the cold weather was a good excuse to huddle up with Francis in a big, fluffy blanket in the candle-light and watch old movies.

Alfred didn't like cold one bit.

Usually this wasn't much of a problem for him – back in America he could just _stay inside_. The worst of his weather had been over the winter break, so he could stay in his lovely warm bed, and not even know about the Arctic weather outside his window. Sadly though, in Britain it seemed the cold weather came early. Last year it'd been quite a warm winter, and hadn't snowed once. That was something a lot of students were _very_ pissed off about – some even went on protests outside the grounds. It did seem a little pointless to protest at the sky, though, they soon realised, and walked back inside, tails between their legs. Of course it'd been the twins who'd lead the protests. On the other hand, no snow for Alfred meant big smiles and very happy moods.

This year, though, Arthur was insisting on doing winter-y things. Going ice skating, picking chestnuts, going Christmas present shopping (in _September!?)_ and even went so far to bake a Yule log and some mince pies. The plan had _seemed_ like a good one, and Alfred was looking forward to the baking, until halfway through he remembered that Arthur could _not_ cook. This baking spree had caused a lot of stomach-related casualties in the dormitories for those stupid (and unfortunate) enough to actually eat food that'd been near Arthur.

The 1st of October was the coldest day yet, something that put Arthur in a very good mood, and Alfred in a very bad one. Luckily, Arthur remembered Alfred's hatred of the cold weather, and decided to be kind to his boyfriend, and, taking extra care not to wake him up when climbing out of the covers, the Brit got changed very quickly and went into the kitchen to make himself breakfast and a cup of tea. Arthur quickly downed the food, and then went back into the bedroom to pick out one of his many scarves and meet Alastair for an early walk. His brother had been scarily hung-up on early-morning fitness sessions recently, something that both made Arthur worry a little, but also feel good that Alastair was pushing himself. The worry came from the fact that usually when Alastair was trying to do something that pushed him, it usually meant he was trying to impress someone, and that never usually went down well.

Arthur then had a cute idea. Before leaving, he ripped a page out of a nearby notebook, and went into the kitchen, cutting the paper into a little heart. Grabbing a red pen, Arthur wrote in the middle of the heart a little 'I love you' message, and then stuck the heart in the gap between the frames of the mirror, knowing Alfred would see it there. The Brit then crept over to their make-shift double-bed, and from their mountain of cushions and pillows that dominated one side of the bed he pulled out the bear that Alfred had given to him a year or so ago. Arthur smiled at the nameless bear, remembering how adorable Alfred had been when giving it to him all that time ago. He took the bear, and gently lifting up the bed covers, placed it in the nest of Alfred's arms, so he'd see it when he woke up. Arthur had half a mind to even go as far to get a hot water bottle and numerous other items that would warm Alfred up, but the clock reminded him that if he was any longer here, Alastair wouldn't be very happy.

Sighing, Arthur smiled, whispering a goodbye to the very asleep Alfred, and closed the door quietly behind him. Arthur was not happy with his relationship at the minute. He knew that when they'd started dating they'd been too young, and that was probably why their relationship was dying now, rather than blossoming. It really was starting to worry Arthur if he and Alfred were ever actually going to make it _work_ between them. He knew that, because of his insecurities, their relationship was going to be hard enough to save – Google had told him that much. But there had to be another way to save a relationship, surely?

Sadly, Arthur knew there'd be someone who would be perfect to ask. That exact person had helped him with relationship problems. The trouble was bucking up the courage to ignore his pride and knock on the door of Francis Bonnefoy and beg for help in his failing relationship.

_After my walk_, Arthur promised himself _after my job with Alastair, I will forget about all pride-issues, and go and ask for Francis' help. He'll give it to me, of course. After all, the way things are heading, he'll my brother-in-law in a few years. Wait. That is if they allow gay marriages in the future. I hope they do… it'd be really nice to marry Alfred. That's _not_ important right now, Arthur!_

"You're late," Alastair glared at his brother as Arthur approached, "I take the liberty of getting here really, _really_ early – and you _know_ I suck with mornings – and you have the nerve to be _late?"_ luckily, it seemed Alastair was too tired to get seriously pissed with his little brother.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry – you know I'm terrible with mornings too, though," Arthur pouted, "So where are we walking?"

"I don't give a fuck, I just want to walk _somewhere,"_ Alastair said stonily, not attempting to mask his terrible mood.

"Fine, fine, we may as well walk around the grounds. I haven't had chance to explore this place in a while because of all the coursework…" Arthur sighed. It seemed like such a waste to live right in the middle of god knows how many acres of land and never get a chance to see it all.

"Lead the way, princess." Alastair glared at his brother, following Arthur when the blonde set off in the direction of where the duck-pond was rumoured to be.

"Don't call me _princess_." Arthur scowled, "If you're going to give me a royal title as a nickname, I'd much prefer prince. Owain's the princess of the family, anyway."

Alastair glared at Arthur, "Don't say that, you know he hates being called feminine things."

"So that makes it okay for you to call _me _princess?" Arthur said, narrowing his eyes.

"Oh come on, you don't _actually_ look like a girl! You can tell you're a guy, but hell, Owain is much more feminine than most girls in Coverack," Alastair jolted a finger over in the direction of the all-girl's school.

"That's only because he looks after himself. He has soft skin, long eyelashes, quite long hair which he sometimes pins back with cute little hair accessories…" Arthur stopped himself, "Okay he is pretty girly. But don't call me 'princess'!"

"Fine, fine! If I'd known you'd kick up this much of a fuss I'd have never given you a harmless nickname!" Alastair growled in frustration.

Arthur felt a smile play about his lips, "We're _still _arguing even at this age…" he giggled slightly, "I remember the first thing you said to me was something like…"

"'Why're your eyebrows so big?'" the two said together, and then looked at each other, and burst out laughing.

"Then you told me that mine were just as big as yours," Alastair smiled, "You should've stayed that small – you were cute back then. Like a little bunny rabbit."

"Personally I'm glad you grew up – you never suited being small. I remember having a dream once that you had fox ears and a tail and came to chase me through a big forest…" Arthur shuddered, "Scary nightmare."

"I do like being the stars of nightmares," Alastair winked playfully. Arthur liked his brother when they weren't arguing. But soon their rather pointless conversation fell into the awkward-silence point in it's cycle, and the two just walked in silence.

The silence lasted as long as Arthur could bear it, and soon the Brit found himself asking, "So… have you got your eye on any girls?" he paused, "… guys?"

Alastair laughed wryly, "Hah, d'ya think I'd be wasting my mornings going on pointless walks if I'd got myself a lass? Not likely. As for guys, well, they can go fuck themselves."

"Pansexual or bisexual?" Arthur asked.

"The fuck?" Alastair narrowed his eyes.

"You – are you pansexual or bisexual?" Arthur asked again, sighing at Alastair's vacant expression, "Bisexual is where you're attracted to guys and girls, yeah? So you could hit on a guy if you were bisexual. Pansexual is where you just don't care _what_ someone is, as long as you love them, understand?"

Alastair narrowed his eyes in though, "Yeah, I think I get it…" he paused, "Pansexual. I think."

Arthur nodded, "I see…" then, changing the subject, "How's Elizabeth?"

"Oh God, not her." Alastair groaned, looking about ready to rip his eyes out.

"You complain about her so much, but you always go crawling back to her… what _is_ it with you and her?" Arthur chuckled, not meaning anything hurtful with his words.

Alastair simply shrugged, completely defeated, "I don't even _know_. I'm not lying when I say I can't stand her – I really, really can't… but I don't know… It's like she's some sort of insane drug. You know those drugs that are _fucking awesome_ when you first try them, but soon they get pretty sucky, but by that time you're already hooked on them, so you have to keep taking them, even though they make you feel like shit? It's like that."

"You need to go to rehab…" Arthur smiled half-heartedly, "You should talk to Owain."

"Fuck no." Alastair growled.

"Why're you avoiding him? I thought you two sorted things out? Isn't it a bit childish to just _sulk?_" Arthur pointed out.

Shaking his head, Alastair sighed, "I just don't want to ruin things for him…"

"Oh no, now don't go pulling the 'I'm such a charitable person' card! We _both_ know you're not that selfless – you're just avoiding him for your sake!"

"Thanks, Arthur. Love you too." Alastair sighed, "But you're right. I'm a selfish bastard."

"Well, at least you can actually admit it… Not a lot of people can – so congratulations, I guess…"

"We should head back," Alastair quickly changed the subject, flipping up his phone to check the time, "The bell for form's gunna go in half an hour."

"Shit. And we've walked pretty far…" Arthur sighed, mentally postponing his talking session with Francis until after school.

"Race?" Alastair offered childishly.

"You're on." Arthur grinned at his brother, and the two took off towards the castle.

* * *

"Arthur…?" Alfred muttered, waking up very cold, and feeling weirdly lonely. The American had been awoken by a very unpleasant and confusing dream in which Francis had crowned himself King of Winter, and decided to make Arthur his queen, and Alfred was forced to watch the both of them flirt while polishing their shoes… or something. It was a little un-nerving that Arthur was absent from his side; Alfred was happily used to waking up either in Arthur's arms, or holding Arthur in _his_ arms. Instead he had a bear. He was about to throw the stuffed animal back in the pile that was slowly stealing all of their sleeping space, until he realised just which bear it was.

It was the friend bear, Alfred grinned to himself, snuggling it to his cheek. Yes, he called it the friend bear, because it gave people friends. Alfred didn't care that it was lame and dorky, it was still cute to him.

The American rolled out of bed, not liking the idea of a whole day of lessons ahead of him. He frowned – you shouldn't have to have school on such cold days. It'll… freeze your brain cells or something. He shivered when the cover came off him, letting out all of the heat that'd been collected overnight. What he wouldn't give for five more minutes under those toasty sheets…

Sadly, duty called, and Alfred knew full well that he was already pushing being late, and another minute wasting time would add to the chance of Miss Héderváry making him scrape all the ice off her windows of her car for the rest of the week. She and Roderich had decided to live back at their own house, so they'd been driving to work, rather than living in the building like the rest of the teachers. They'd decided this would be 'for the sake of the baby', though Alfred wasn't too sure how that would help a baby.

Come to think of it, Alfred didn't know a _thing_ about babies. They weren't taught childcare in their school, as they were all _boys_, who, at this age, didn't give a damn about childbirth or pregnancy. It did seem pretty pointless to teach childcare to a bunch of boys, the majority of which were gay, when they'd probably never used the information.

Alfred wondered into the bathroom, having a very quick, very warm shower. By the time he'd dried his hair roughly with a towel and gone into the kitchen to make himself breakfast, the American saw Arthur sitting at the table, nibbling on a piece of toast, a cup of tea in the other hand. Alfred smiled when he noticed Arthur had made him some toast too. Aww, he'd even cut the crusts off! How nice of him.

"It's still warm," Arthur smiled, "Morning."

"Thanks, Artie!" Alfred grinned, blowing Arthur a kiss and digging into the very warm toast, shivering at how delicious it was. Arthur's toast was _always_ the best – Alfred had tried to make it exactly the same, but it never did taste quite right. Toast was something Arthur _could_ make, apparently.

"You went out with Alastair, then?" Alfred smiled.

Arthur looked up from the book he was flicking through, "I did. It was quite a nice walk. A little too much talking for my liking, though. It's not as cold as it was yesterday," Arthur said, "Though the wind does have a bit of a chill to it – I'd bring that scarf you bought the other day."

Alfred nodded enthusiastically. Last night he'd gone out and bought himself a luxuriously warm red, blue and white scarf. It reminded him of back home in America – he'd had a scarf just like it when he was little.

"Well, the bell's about to go. You coming?" Arthur got up, placing a bookmark in his book and snapping it shut, "Bag? Coat? Scarf?"

Alfred chuckled slightly at Arthur's checklist, "My ultra-sexy-cute-amazing boyfriend?"

"Check," Arthur squeezed Alfred's hand, letting go to put his mug in the sink, and then linking their arms, "Though I don't think it makes sense to say I'm cute _and_ sexy. I think you can only be one or the other… Unless you're a seductive five year old…?"

"Pedophile! Pedophile! I'm living with a pedophile! Someone save me!" Alfred called, running out the door, waving his arms about.

Rolling his eyes, Arthur followed, checking his reflection in the mirror. With a sigh, Arthur realised that Alfred hadn't seen his subtly-placed love note. Or if he had, he hadn't said anything about it. A little reluctantly, Arthur took the heart from the place it'd been wedged it in the mirror and screwed it up into a little ball, throwing it in the wastepaper basket on his way out to follow Alfred.

* * *

"And _that_, _mon cher_, is the secret to my abnormally large—"

"Francis? Can I have a word?" Arthur swiftly interrupted, pulling Francis away from his… very engaging conversation with Owain and Matthew, both looking a little scared, a little bit embarrassed, and more than a little jealous. It was in the middle of Science, and Professor Wang had gone down to the P.E. department to collect some heavy equipment, and had taken Alfred, now one of the strongest in the class, to help him. Arthur decided he'd been blessed with a pretty good opportunity to discuss relationship problems with Francis.

"_Mon petite _Arthur! What on earth can I do for you?" Francis stood up as if trying to emphasise the point that he'd grown _an awful lot_ more than Arthur had over the summer. He hadn't stopped rubbing it in Arthur's face ever since term had started.

"I need you to come over here." Arthur narrowed his eyes, grabbing the French teen by the sleeve of his blazer, and dragging him less-than-civilly over to a deserted corner of the classroom they were in.

Back at where Francis had been discussing impressively sized body-parts with his boyfriend and… adulterer (?) the two were left in an awkward silence. Owain had the pleasure of shattering it.

"He's mine, you know." Owain growled, shooting daggers at Matthew.

Matthew looked up from his phone where he'd been pretending to text, "What're you talking about?" Owain could hear the very slight stammer in the Canadian's weak voice.

"I know you've probably done something to him – I don't know, attempted to seduce him or whatever," Owain leaned closer with every word, "But I know Francis – I know he'll never give into your tricks, so you can just _give up_. You had your chance with him, and you blew it – you went out with Gilbert instead. Now he's _mine_."

"Well, from what I can gather, you had _your_ chance with him too, and you blew it," Matthew snarled, "But that didn't stop you from swooping up like a greedy vulture and, when he was most vulnerable, you captured him again."

"I did not '_capture'_ Francis! You just liked the feeling of getting to choose between people! You liked the fact you were being noticed for _once _in your pointless life, and you want that powerful feeling around you again. But you need to wake up and realise that Francis asked _me _out."

Matthew laughed dryly, "Only because you _asked_ him to ask you out!"

Owain cursed mentally – Francis had promised not to tell anyone about that! "It doesn't change the fact that I'm the one kissing him and you're not."

"Oh really? I wouldn't be so sure about that…" Matthew smirked, suddenly regretting his words.

Luckily, Owain didn't take him too seriously, "Yeah, yeah, whatever you want me to believe, Canadian."

"You place too much faith in your boyfriend, you know…" Matthew drawled, "Perhaps you don't know him as well as you claim to."

"Whatever! I've known Francis a lot longer than _you_." Well… that was a bit of a lie, "Get over yourself, slut."

That did it. Matthew gritted his teeth, and raised his hand for a killer slap. Owain would _regret_ that!

* * *

"So, _mon cher_, what can I do for you?"

"I hate having to ask you this," _again, _Arthur added in his head, "But I need help."

"Well we all knew _that_, but sadly I'm neither a brain surgeon nor a therapist. Try asking Feliciano." Francis turned, grinning to himself, knowing that Arthur would be extremely pissed at that.

As Francis had predicted, Arthur was indeed gritting his teeth, though he managed to hold his annoyance in, "Shut it and get back over here. I need help with my relationship."

"You should have told me, _mon cher_, I'm not a mind reader, and, well, we all know you're a little…" Francis tapped the side of his head, motioning that Arthur was insane, "But I can see why you need help with your relationship, too… You're feeling insecure? Like Alfred's not really interested any more?"

Arthur nodded, biting his cheek nervously, "Yeah… what should I do?"

"_Mon cher,_ there is not a lot I can offer you. I hate to tell you – actually that's a lie; I love to tell you that these are all _your_ problems. Only you can fix them. I don't really know what to do; I've never felt insecure about myself. I'd tell you to go and talk to Matthew, but I don't think he'd be much help, as apparently he and Gilbert are falling just as quickly as you and Alfred."

"Thanks, Francis," Arthur sighed sarcastically, though it didn't have it's usual bite to it – he just sounded tired, upset and a little bit scared, "I knew I could rely on you to enlighten me," he then added in his normal tone, without a hint of sarcasm, "Thanks, Francis. I really do appreciate you trying."

Francis watched as Arthur walked away, suddenly feeling very guilty, "Arthur, wait."

Arthur turned around, an eyebrow raised.

"I think I might be able to help you." Francis said seriously, "Come here. Though, as I said before – I've never been in this situation before. I'm just improvising and guessing what might happen."

"Oh? Go on…" Arthur said while walking back, sounding genuinely interested.

"So… you feel like Alfred is loosing interest in you? You want him back in your arms, but you're not sure how to do it?"

"Exactly."

"Well, _mon cher_, if I was you – and I'm very glad I'm _not_ – then I would just make yourself more interesting. Find new things to talk about, try and make things less of a routine, and more of a 'spontaneous rush of love', understand? Kiss him first thing in the morning, or just randomly in the middle of class. _Never_ let go of his hand for your _life_. I know many, _many_ people that say hand-holding is one of the most romantic things about a relationship. Just remember, it's not really the big things that matter – it's lots of little small things all added together to make one huge block of successful love!" Francis drew the block in the air with his fingers as if Arthur didn't know what a block looked like.

"I tried that, though. It didn't work – he doesn't notice them…" this made Arthur both smile fondly at how adorably oblivious Alfred was, but also give that fond smile a hint of remorse and sadness, as it really did hurt when Alfred was so oblivious he couldn't see the obvious – for example; _their failing relationship._

"Well _make _him notice them, _mon cher_." Francis advised, smiling; "Now we'd best return to Owain and Matthew, _non?"_

Arthur nodded, and the two of them turned, just in time to see the beginnings of Owain and Matthew's 'fight'. Matthew was raising his hand to slap Owain. Matthew was too slow however, and Owain jumped out of the way, and slapped Matthew right back in the face.

If you listed the things that boys schools missed out on, the most obvious choice would be 'girls', 'boobs', or 'pretty things'. Though, one thing that people often don't think about is one very amusing thing also quite high up on that list. Bitch fights. And Goverek Boy's School was lucky enough to witness one of those rare phenomenons today.

Before the class knew it, Matthew and Owain were attacking each other right at the front of the class, squealing insults at each other just like you'd expect two teenage girls to. They were doing quite a good job, too. Everyone crowded round the two of them, no one quite sure what to say, until Lovino started the predictable cheering of '_Fight! Fight! Fight!'_ and so on, until the entire class – even _Francis_, who was shut up quickly when Arthur elbowed him in the rib – was cheering on Owain and Matthew's hilarious, bordering terrifying fight. Everyone was hungry for blood, especially the two usually very respectable, very shy, and very quiet boys.

"That is _enough!_" Professor Wang entered, slamming down a collection of books he'd carried in, and then helping Alfred, who was carrying a very heavy looking, complicated piece of equipment, through the door, before swiftly standing in between Owain and Matthew, who were now concentrating on ripping each other's long, blonde hair out, and stopped the fight immediately.

"Everyone, _sit down_. You're meant to be a civilised group of fourteen to sixteen year olds, but when I come back into my class after nipping downstairs for twenty minutes, I find _this?"_ Professor Wang had hold of Owain and Matthew by the collars of their blazers, holding them apart, though they were still trying to claw at each other, and if you listened carefully you could hear very softly whispered curse words flying from one to the other.

"You two, you're coming with me to my office. As for _you lot_," the Professor eyed his class, narrowing his eyes, "I'll call for Coach Braginski to come and keep an eye on you while I'm gone. I can tell you for a fact I've never seen such disgraceful behaviour! Perhaps I might understand if you were all in common schools, but this is one of the best _private _schools in the entire United Kingdom – this behaviour is not acceptable!"

The class stayed silent, looking up at their teacher. Half of the class, the more 'rebellious' students, were trying to will themselves not to burst out into fits of laugher, while the other half of the class, the civilised students, were seriously regretting their behaviour.

"Jesus…" Alfred muttered, sliding into the seat next to Arthur, "What did I miss?"

Arthur grinned a little smile at Alfred, whispering back, "One of the most hilarious fights I've ever seen," he shrugged, "I think Owain called Matthew a slut or something… Francis, d'you know why it broke out?"

Francis looked over at Alfred and Arthur, smiling smoothly, "I know I'm brilliant, but sadly I don't know that. Not many people saw the beginning of the fight," he shrugged nonchalantly. But whenever Arthur and Alfred turned their backs on his to talk about something else, Francis bit his tongue worriedly. He knew exactly why that fight had broken out, and he knew it was his fault.

**A/N**

**I've been wanting to write about Matthew and Owain fighting for a while X'D it was fun :3 I love it when the shy characters turn out the be the deadliest. XD  
And don't think we're out of the dark with Arthur and Alfred yet, dearies XD this it only the beginning of their problems. /insert evil laugh/  
Thank you for your kind reviews/faves/follows, guys! :D free invisible cookies for whoever reviews! XD  
Love you all ^^**


	7. Woodlouse

**Chapter seven – Woodlouse**

Arthur was very pleased with himself. He sat grinning to himself on his and Alfred's bed, admiring his work. This plan was going to work – it'd be one of the most successful things he'd ever done! He was definitely impressed with what a bit of pink stationary, scissors, glue and few other inanimate objects could do when you put your mind to it.

Now he just had to wait for Alfred to wake up and his plan would be complete!

Arthur wasn't the most patient soul in the universe. Actually, it always used to be _him_ that slept in, while Alfred was pained with waiting for him to wake up. But now it had reversed, like a lot of things in their relationship, and now Arthur found himself resisting the urge to poke Alfred's soft looking cheeks.

So instead, he took to admiring his own work.

Arthur had taken Francis' advice to the max. Francis had told him in his annoying French accent 'he needed to be more interesting', and that their relationship needed to be more 'spontaneous'. Well right here was interesting and spontaneous. It was subtle too, but not as subtle as Arthur's last plan of hiding little notes everywhere. Hopefully Alfred would notice this. Arthur had gone round all the things he knew Alfred used daily – the microwave, his spray, his iPod and school books – you name it, Arthur had suck a little note or heart on to each object, with a single word. Alone, the word would be something nice like 'perfect' or 'mine', but if you took each of the sticky notes and arranged them in order and added in a few connective words, a message would be clear up to Alfred of 'Everything about you is perfect, you'll be mine and I'll be yours forever. I love you.'

Quite pleased with himself, Arthur folded his arms seeing no way how this plan could go wrong. He'd even clipped a rose from a bush out in the school gardens and scattered the petals around Alfred's pillows. He'd made Alfred breakfast, and Arthur had decided that the minute Alfred awoke; he'd be tackled with a good morning kiss. Everything would be perfect!

… That is if Alfred was ever going to wake up.

Arthur decided to stop torturing himself and walked through to the kitchen again. He'd been up since six, and it'd only taken him half an hour to make and place everything – he'd thought it would've taken at least an hour. Alfred got up at half seven usually, though sometimes it was pushed to quarter to, or even sometimes eight. That meant Arthur had about an hour to kill. Of course he'd already gotten ready for school – he was ready to walk out of the door, in fact. Arthur decided he may as well do something a little productive with his time, so he sat down at the table and began looking through his science book, trying to memorise names of cells.

An hour and fifteen minutes later, it was five past eight and Alfred still wasn't up.

At this point, Arthur had stopped watching the clock – he was too absorbed in his revision. Of course this was a little bit of a problem. Alfred never set an alarm – he relied on Arthur to wake him up. But now with Arthur in a world of his own and not noticing the time, Alfred was left sleeping an awful lot longer than he should've been.

It was twenty to nine by the time Arthur looked up at the clock. Blinking a few times at the time the hands showed, and checking on his own watch on his phone, Arthur slapped a palm up to his forehead, groaning, already running through to the bedroom for Alfred to wake up.

"Alfie, Alfie, we're going to be late. Like super-mega-late. You need to get up right now," Arthur shook the American awake, begging that this would be a morning where he woke up and was ready for action, rather than a morning where it took him fifteen minutes to get out of bed.

"Artie? What? What's going on…?" the American mumbled sleepily.

Arthur didn't answer – he was too busy rummaging for Alfred's glasses. He shoved them on Alfred's nose, and then gave an explanation, "I got caught up in revision – I'm sorry! I forgot to wake you up. You've got fifteen minutes to get ready."

Alfred swore in frustration, leaping up from the bed, suddenly wide awake. Without another word he swooped into the bathroom, brushing his teeth while climbing into his uniform.

Gritting his teeth in frustration, Arthur rubbed his temple with his forefingers. It'd been _his_ fault this was happening now – if he'd kept an eye on the time, this could've been avoided. He knew _something_ had to go wrong with his plan – something _always_ went wrong, but he really wished it hadn't been something as big as this. Alfred probably wouldn't even notice the little hearts and pointless nothings Arthur had stuck up everywhere.

Alfred - having been woken up in a rush and in the middle of a _very_ good dream – really wasn't in the best of moods – anything anyone said to him would have the risk of ending in shouting and violence. That was a _bit_ of an overstatement, but Alfred did feel about ready to punch something as he brushed his teeth.

"Why didn't you wake me up?" Alfred called through to Arthur. He didn't mean to sound so mean about the way he said it – he'd really just been curious! But because of his bad mood, the words naturally came out like he was accusing Arthur of something.

Arthur blinked a few times, "I-I'm sorry, Alfred, I got a little distracted with something…" he sounded more than a little unsure about Alfred's tone, perhaps even a little afraid.

This would've been a perfect opportunity for Alfred to say 'no, no, it's fine – I should buy myself an alarm clock. I'm sorry I was so rude a second ago,' or something to that affect. However, his cocky, stupid mouth took over and said instead, "Jeeze, Arthur, it's not _that_ hard to wake someone up in the morning!"

Arthur visibly flinched, "I know, really, Alfred, I'm sorry."

For some reason this annoyed Alfred even _further._ Just the fact knowing that Arthur would let him say something as rude as that and _agree_ with him! "Arthur! How can you say that? I was clearly talking out of line a second ago, why didn't you tell me just to buy an alarm clock or something? You need to stop being such a pushover!"

"What? Alfred I really don't know what you're talking about… If I've done something to annoy you, then I'm really sorry…"

"That's the _point!_ You haven't done anything to annoy me!"

Arthur blinked, "Then why on earth are you annoyed with me?"

"I don't know!" Alfred suddenly realised he wasn't making any sense, "You should care more about yourself! Stop being so… carefree!"

"So you're saying you want me to be annoyed?" Arthur asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Yes! You shouldn't let me talk to you like you're nothing!" Alfred really didn't know what he was saying anymore.

Arthur furrowed his eyebrows, "Alfred, I could see you were annoyed and I didn't want to create more of a scene… I didn't want to make it any more difficult for you – I should've woken you up, and I'm sorry… But now you're saying that I should be annoyed with you for you relying on me…?"

"No! Yes! Oh God I don't know!" Alfred shouted, knowing he really sounded stupid. This only annoyed him further, and suddenly the wall looked like a very comforting place to attack brutally.

"Alfred, I think you should just get your breakfast…" Arthur muttered, gently leading Alfred through to the kitchen.

"Yeah… Thanks…" The American muttered, finally being able to keep a lid on his temper.

All was going a little better now – there was no more shouting, and Alfred was making good time. Little did Arthur know that it would be his own plan to come flying right back at him to ruin everything.

Alfred had thrown his breakfast down his neck as quick as he could, and was now reaching into the cupboard to get some food to bring with him for school. His hands fell on his favourite brand of cookies, and he lifted the entire packet, about to throw it into his bag. Suddenly he stopped, noticing something stuck to the cookies. Arthur looked over, and with a little jolt he noticed one of the sticky notes he'd attached to Alfred's favourite objects. This particular sticky note was his favourite, as a matter of fact – it was a cute little heart with the word 'love' written on it in lovely, fancy writing that looked a lot like Francis' handwriting. Not that Arthur had copied it or anything. Of course not.

"What's this?" Alfred pulled the sticky note off the cookie, examining it.

"It's my message to you," Arthur smiled warmly, pecking a kiss to Alfred's cheek, "I love you, you know."

Alfred didn't seem as fond of the note as Arthur was.

"Arthur, I'm not a _girl_. Hell I know I'm gay, but something like this? _Liiiittle_ bit girly. Well more than a little bit – a lot more than a little bit. I mean I could understand Francis doing it to Owain, but me? Nah." Alfred raised an eyebrow.

Arthur very suddenly felt like he wanted to cry, run away, and hit Alfred all at once.

"Alfred, what's _wrong?_ You're not acting like you." Arthur muttered, narrowing his eyes and trying to control his feelings.

Alfred swallowed. He knew the exact reason he was so annoyed – it was because that very good dream he'd been having _hadn't_ been about Arthur. It hadn't even involved Arthur. It had involved someone that really shouldn't be in his dreams. Especially as this dream had been a bit of a romantic one. Alfred was never going to admit this to Arthur, though, so in his hot-headed state, Alfred lashed out.

"You! That is exactly what's wrong! One minute you're all over me, the next you think I'm dating you for a joke, and the minute after that you're in a world of your own! Then you try to make it better and treat me like a girl. _I'm not a girl_. Perhaps if you can't accept that, you should go over to Coverack and take your pick out of the girls there! I'm sure they'd be more than happy to date you! If anyone's a girl in this relationship, it's _you_ with your queer feelings and your cliché, 'romantic' ideas! But you need to get a grip – you need to get some confidence and stop being so insecure, then you need a reality check – life isn't like those chick-flicks you used to read! It's not full of flowers and 'I love yous'! Just _wake up,_ Arthur!"

Silence for a second.

Arthur could've quite easily burst into tears. He could've flipped out and hit Alfred. He could've demanded for the American to apologise.

Instead though, Arthur bust out laughing.

Alfred stared at him for a moment, wondering if he what he was seeing was reality.

"One day, Alfred, someone is going to give you a great big slap, and after that, I really can't wait until that happens. You don't like all that stuff about me, eh? Well it seems you've been dating the wrong Arthur Kirkland for the past year or so, because newsflash! I'm insecure, I like romance, and I like trying to show the person I love just how much I love them. Apparently that's just not good enough for you," Arthur stopped with his hysterical, scary laughing, "You think I need to wake up? I think _you_ need to do that, my friend."

Alfred watched as Arthur turned on his heels, and just walked out of the door, picking up his school bag as he went. The door shut the sound it made when it shut ominously echoing around in Alfred's head like a big, fat full-stop.

Slamming the cupboard shut and swearing hotly, Alfred growled to himself. He'd _really_ fucked up. Oh how fucking _brilliant._ Way to _fucking go_, Alfred.

* * *

The day passed like normal. It was actually scary how normal it was. Alfred was late for form, and given a detention. However, Miss Héderváry could tell something was up with the American – his uniform was everywhere, his hair greasy and unwashed, and he wasn't sitting next to Arthur. The detention would be a _lot _more beneficial than writing lines, Miss Héderváry would make sure of that.

Arthur made sure not to make eye contact with Alfred for the rest of that day. It was childish, yes, but he was giving Alfred the silent treatment. He decided to hang around with his brother Owain and the Frog. Both were surprisingly willing to take Arthur under their wing. Of course they both knew that there'd been an issue with Alfred, but both were gracious enough not to hinder Arthur about it. They'd known Arthur for years – he'd come to them when he was ready.

Owain happily took Arthur back to his and Francis' dorm, uncaring about Arthur's complaints that he needed to get something back in his own dorm. Owain was clever enough not to let Arthur anywhere near Alfred for at least twenty four hours. It'd only end in tears.

Setting Arthur down on the bed, Owain went through to the kitchen, setting the kettle to boil.

"Want me to go and get that book he's whining about?" Francis leaned against the door frame casually, jerking his thumb towards the door.

Just as Owain was about to smile happily and nod, he stopped himself, having an idea, "No, it's okay. I know where it is, and besides, I want a word with Alfred. Keep an eye on him while I'm gone?" Owain jerked his head to Arthur, who'd now curled up into a ball.

"He reminds me of a woodlouse…" Francis muttered, "Fine, fine. I'll try not to attack him while I'm gone…"

"Thanks. _Be nice._" Owain smiled, stretching up to peck him on the cheek, "_Je t'aime~"_

"_Fi'n caru ti hefyd,"_ Francis chuckled, answering in Welsh before ruffling Owain's hair as he went. He _loved_ it when Owain got all annoyed about his hair being messed up – it was just too adorable.

Before long, Owain had gone, and Francis was left alone with Arthur.

Sighing, Francis sat himself down next to the Brit.

"Your stupid advice made Alfred hate me…" Arthur muttered with a pout.

"No, it wasn't my advice that made him hate you, it was how you acted upon it," Francis spat back. He then remembered that Owain had asked of him, and sighed, "_Mon cloporte,_ what happened?"

Arthur shifted his position, looking away from Francis, "Nothing."

"Well that is a clear lie."

With a dramatic sigh, Arthur lay out on the bed, closing his eyes, "I… I'm insecure. Alfred doesn't like that. Among other things."

Francis raised an eyebrow, "It must've been more than _that_…"

Arthur examined his fingers, and then decided to tell Francis. He told him about the entire argument, and how both he and Alfred had been out of order.

"… And after that I just started laughing hysterically," Arthur shrugged, "Maybe I'm going insane? I should've just apologised and got over it… It's not even that big of a deal!"

Francis sighed, "_Mon cher, _I think you are most definitely in the right here. I don't like to admit it, but if anything you were being too tolerant of Alfred. It wasn't right for him to treat you like that, and you need to realise that."

"Treat him like what?" a Scottish accent called through the door, and in walked Alastair, "Owain called me here?"

"Ah, you just missed him _mon cher_," Francis glared at the Scot, "He's gone to collect a book."

"Oh. So what's going on here?" asked oblivious Alastair, "Arthur, are you okay? What's happened?"

Francis' glare increased, "Arthur and Alfred are on the verge of breaking up, that's what's happened you blind idiot!"

"Alright, alright, retract the claws, Frenchie!" Alastair furrowed his brows, kneeling down to Arthur, hesitantly patting his little brother's knee, "How?"

"Basically Arthur attempted to be romantic and sappy – he misinterpreted advice from me, see – but this just pissed Alfred off. Said American effectively told Arthur that he didn't like his personality, and had a go at him for not being his humanised alarm clock in the morning. Also he called Arthur a girl, and said his feelings were 'queer'. We have yet to work out if that was the gay kind of queer, or the strange kind of queer, though both are quite bad." Francis shrugged, harshly summarising it all. Arthur sobbed a little at the nutshell, and suddenly Francis wished he'd been a little less brutal with his words.

"If you didn't hear, I was asking my _brother_." Alastair spat, and then turned to Arthur again.

"It was what he said…" Arthur pointed at Francis, returning to his woodlouse position again.

Alastair growled a little from the back of his throat, "That American is going to get a serious punching from me."

"Already taken care of." Owain walked through the door looking particularly murderous. He was dusting off his hands, which looked oddly red. His cheeks were pink, and he looked a little out of breath, "I heard everything, there's no reason to explain it all. Alfred also gave me an insight of what happened, but it was awfully different from that version. It made _Arthur _look like the bad guy. He _really _needs to learn when to shut up, doesn't he?"

"You didn't hit him, did you?" Arthur looked up, panicked.

"Of course I did. What do you take me for?" Owain snapped, clearly annoyed. His expression then softened, "Sorry Arthur, I didn't mean to snap at you. Alfred just _seriously_ pissed me off."

"Nice one," Alastair winked, high-fiving his brother gleefully, "You make me proud. I'm still going round there to bash his nose in, though."

"I'd leave it until tomorrow. It'll be more satisfactory," Owain advised, not sounding like himself at all.

"Please be gentle with him…" Arthur muttered, but was promptly 'shh'-ed by the other three.

"You shouldn't be sticking up for him, idiot!" Alastair frowned.

"I hate to say it, but the eyesore is right, _mon cloporte._ Hmm… I do like that new nickname I've given you…" Francis muttered.

Owain smiled a little, pulling Arthur into a hug, "Don't worry, Artie, we're here! We can watch TV until you fall asleep, yeah? And you don't need to worry about anything. It's all fine."

"Thanks…" Arthur sniffed, feeling pathetic.

Alastair then interrupted, "Oh, by the way, why did you text me to come here?"

Owain looked up, "Oh yeah! Sorry. I'll talk to you outside."

Francis raised an eyebrow, smiling, "_Mon cher_, anything you need to share with me?"

Owain knew Francis was simply curious – his boyfriend had never pressured him to tell him anything, and this time would be no different. Francis was only making sure that Owain knew that his ears would be open if they were ever needed, and if they weren't well that didn't matter either.

All the same, Owain still felt a little bad when rejecting Francis' help, "Don't worry, just brother stuff," Owain shrugged, "Could you get the ice cream from the freezer?"

Mock saluting, Francis winked and headed out to the kitchen. Owain waved him away, and then patted Arthur on the head before exiting the room, dragging Alastair along behind him.

"What's going on, Owain?" Alastair raised an eyebrow once the door was shut.

"I've done something stupid…" Owain hung his head, "And it involves Matthew Williams.

**A/N**

**Hey! I need to keep this quick, cause Doctor Who is just about to start!  
Translations – The first two are 'I love you' in French then Welsh, and Francis continually calls Arthur 'My woodlouse' X'DD I'm sorry, I just love that.  
Thank you very much for support XD don't hate Alfred too much! And thank you for/if you plan on reviewing! :D  
I'M OFF TO SEE DOCTOR WHO, THEN! /RAVES/  
LOVE YOU GUYS!**


	8. Stupid Things

**Chapter eight – Stupid things**

Owain's 'stupid' thing, Alastair realised, really was very stupid. It was frustratingly stupid, and Owain was usually _clever_, which made it all the more worthy to rip your hair out about it.

When Owain had gone off to swear at Alfred and curse the American to hell, he'd had an unwanted encounter.

Owain had been walking down the corridors, planning out exactly what he was going to say to Alfred. No matter what Alfred said in reply would affect how Owain reacted! Quite pleased with his aggressive line up of words, the little Welsh boy knocked harshly on the door, letting himself in through the unlocked door.

"Wha'ddya want?" Alfred didn't even look up from the TV, a spoon still in his mouth. He'd started on the ice cream _already_. Even if he and Arthur did make up, there might be weight issues in their new relationship.

"I've come to get a few things for Arthur. He'll be staying with me tonight, okay?" Owain clenched his jaw.

Alfred shrugged, "Whatever," he commented nonchalantly, still not looking up from the TV.

"While I'm here though…" Owain quickly located the items he needed, so if Alfred got too violent he could run away quickly, "I want to hear your side."

"Why d'ya wanna hear that? It'll just give you another reason to stay pissed at me." Alfred said. Annoyingly, Owain knew he was right.

"I don't think it's fair to judge a situation before knowing both sides of the argument…" Owain said swiftly, quite impressed with how quickly the excuse had been thought up.

Shrugging again, (that was _really_ ticking Owain off) Alfred sighed like he'd been burdened with a great hardship. He swung his body around, finally facing Owain. His eyes were red and puffy, and Owain was pretty sure there were bags under his eyes, "I told Arthur the truth. He couldn't take it, and got pissed at me. He started laughing like a madman, too. Pretty neat."

"What exactly did you say to him?"

"That he needs to man up and get some confidence. But I phrased it better than that," Alfred shrugged, turning towards the TV again, "It was an overreaction, in my opinion."

"Well, I hope for your sake it was, because Arthur definitely isn't acting like himself right now. I have yet to hear what happened from him, but if it _is_ accurate to what you said, then you can assume that you'll have four, maybe even five if Peter's up for it, angry Kirklands charging at you in the morning. I used to do karate, you know? I don't really look dangerous, but I can punch people. I also listen in biology and PE, so I know where it'll hurt to hit people. As for Alastair and the twins, well, they're just a bunch of insane animals."

Alfred didn't say anything, climbing to his feet and heading through to the kitchen. He returned a second later with a fresh tub of ice cream, and he plopped himself back on his seat, acting like Owain hadn't said anything.

It was _more_ than a little awkward on Owain's part.

"How can you just _sit_ there and act like _nothing's happened?_ Wake up call, Alfred – the guy you were dating has pretty much broken up with you, and you act like nothing important has changed! What're you _doing?_ Did Arthur really mean that little to you?" Owain spat, all his anger finally spilling out.

Alfred raised an eyebrow, "Cool it."

"Do _not_ tell me to 'cool it'!" Owain said, gritting his teeth, "How about you learn to _care_ for once in your oblivious, narcissistic, _dense_ life!?"

Alfred narrowed his eyes, "You think I don't _care?"_

"You're certainly acting like it!"

The hollow laugh that followed from the pit of Alfred's stomach wasn't unlike Arthur's insane little cackles that morning, "Trust me, Owain. I care. I care an _awful lot_."

"Well you should start _acting_ like it. Grow up and accept that this one's your fault, because we're certainly not letting Arthur blame himself! If you're as big as you say you are, Alfred Jones, then perhaps you should accept your failures and come and fix them!"

Alfred scowled childishly, "I really don't feel like it."

With that, gritting his teeth so hard it felt like they might crack, Owain took a deep breath and stormed up to the frowning American and slapped him clean across the cheek, spitting swear words at him in every language he could think of. Owain wasn't done there, though, oh no. With one look at Alfred's face again, Owain muttered murderous words in Welsh to the American and punched him square on the nose.

Regretting nothing, Owain swept away and collected Arthur's requested items. Slamming the door behind him with an ominous 'bang', Owain curled up in the corridor, trying to control his burning anger so that he didn't hit a wall and break his hand.

Maybe it's been a _bit_ of an overreaction…

Then Owain reminded himself of the promise he and his brother's had made about ten years earlier. It'd been a particularly nasty day, where Daniel had decided to throw something particularly heavy at a six-year-old Owain. The day had ended in shouting and tears – their mother had a very loud, very long argument with Daniel. Alastair and the twins, who were visiting Arthur's house along with Owain, had all found Owain crying in his room, with Arthur and Peter attempting to comfort him. At that point in a rare moment of maturity, the six brothers had all sworn to each other that if anyone was ever mean to any one of them, that one person would have all of the brothers to answer to. They'd even pinky-promised to the deal, and everyone knew you couldn't break a pinky promise.

Smiling to himself, now calmer, Owain rose to his feet. Nope, he most definitely hadn't overreacted. If anything, it was an under-reaction.

That however, was not the 'stupid thing' that he'd done. Oh no. Things got a _lot_ worse from hitting Alfred Jones.

Coming down the corridor at around that moment was Matthew. Alfred had asked Matthew to come round – Alfred needed comforting too, because, little did he let on to Owain, he'd really been regretting his actions, and needed someone to bawl to. Cue the best friend. Well, Alfred wasn't too sure if Matthew was his best friend or not, but he was definitely the friend that was best at listening.

So, that is exactly why Matthew was heading straight for a person he wasn't on best terms with.

Owain looked up from the spot in the corridor he was standing, his gaze hardening as soon as he laid eyes on the Canadian.

"Owain," Matthew nodded in greeting.

"Matthew," Owain said in civil reply.

And then they could've just _got on with their lives_ – but _no_. Owain _had_ to be stupid.

"I know you're trying to talk Francis into a twisted relationship. Perhaps should I go and tell Gilbert?" Owain spat.

"I really don't know what you're talking about, Owain," Matthew turned, batting his eyelashes innocently.

"You know _exactly _what I'm talking about, you slut! We've had this conversation before. It ended up in me slapping you to the ground like the pathetic whore you are!"

"You know, I remember it a little differently – I remember you leaping on to me like a madman, yes, but I seem to remember _me_ beating _you_ to the ground," Matthew replied smoothly, his tone staying level.

"Your memory must be as fucked up as the rest of you, then!" Owain spat, taking a step or two closer to Matthew, clenching his fist, ready to hit him.

"You just can't accept the fact that it's not _me_ wooing him. It's him replying to my flirting." Matthew smirked.

Owain sneered, though he did feel a slight know of worry twist in his stomach. He'd had his suspicions of Francis and Matthew for a while now, but he hadn't for a minute suspected that Francis had given in to Matthew's obvious flirting. Ever since his bitch-fight with Matthew, though, the idea of Francis kissing Matthew didn't seem as impossible as it had before, though.

"Try kissing your own boyfriend," Owain snarled, "Keep your hands off mine."

Matthew didn't answer and just glared at Owain, an eyebrow arched perfectly, "Perhaps you're really as insecure as your brother… Maybe Francs will grow tired of you… Maybe he just _prefers me?"_

When Owain had told Alastair this part of his stupid story, Alastair instantly felt an urge to go and find the Canadian and hit him.

"What happened then?" Alastair had prompted Owain, holding his brother's shoulder for support.

Owain then broke down into uncontrollable sobs. Alastair took a few steps, worried he'd caused the tears, but it soon came apparent that Owain was crying at the memory of what'd happened.

"H-he… He _kissed_ me…"

"What!?" Alastair's eyebrows nearly disappeared through his hairline, "_What!?"_

Owain shook his head, "I-I don't know… I don't even know if it was him who kissed me – I might've kissed _him_… All I know is it happened..."

"But… But…" Alastair just couldn't make sense of it, "_What!?" _he repeated again, still as confused as he was the first time he'd asked.

"I-I don't even know _myself_… Maybe it was Matthew just trying to make me feel guilty? Maybe he wanted to screw with me…? Maybe he really is just a slut… I really don't know… But all I know is it happened."

"So… I can assume it wasn't a sweet peck on the cheek?" Alastair furrowed his brows, scratching the back of his neck.

"No… No. It most definitely wasn't that," Owain sighed, "It was more… biting. Well… I don't really know. It was _long_ – neither of us would stop – we didn't want to seem like the chicken to back down. It was more of a… competition than anything, if that makes sense? He bit my tongue and my bottom lip a few times, I did it right back at him. He finally stopped when I started digging my nails into the back of his neck. I'm glad I decided to grown them, now…"

Alastair nearly chuckled at his brother's almost optimistic finish, but controlled himself, "And what happened after that, then?"

Owain shrugged, "I don't know really, it all went in a bit of a daze, y'know? I definitely remember slapping him. That was fun. Though he did slap me right back. But it didn't hurt," that was a lie if he'd ever told one, "He's _really_ weak! It's hilarious. But he just went on his way into Alfred's room, and nothing else happened."

Alastair nodded, "I see, I see… Well Owain, that really was quite stupid…"

Owain smiled through his now fading tears, "I know… What am I going to do?"

"Don't do anything?"

"No! I can't do that! I feel terrible! I need to go and tell Francis or _something_… And Gilbert has the right to know – I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I kept it all inside and started lying to people…" Owain hung his head.

Hugging his brother, Alastair smiled, "Owain, you need to think about this, right? I'm not saying you should lie to people – y'know, if they ask you '_did you kiss Matthew'_ then tell the truth, but why say anything if no one asks? You never know, your relationship with Francis might take a nose-dive if you tell him. And you can leave Gilbert up to me, yeah? I know your intentions are good, but I think in this situation it might make things worse…"

Owain sighed a little, "I suppose you're right… I still feel uncomfortable…"

"Owain, you said it yourself – that kiss wasn't romantic in the slightest – it was like a competition for power! To distinguish the mouse from the man. You'll be fine, really." Alastair reassured, "Now I think we should get back to comforting our younger brother, don't you?"

"Yeah… Thanks, Alastair. I can always rely on you in situations like these…"

"What're big brothers for?" Alastair smiled weakly, shuffling Owain inside the door.

Alastair sighed mentally – another person had just earned themselves a broken nose. He hoped people would stop being harsh to his brothers – if he had to hit any more people then he might risk suspension.

* * *

Meanwhile, Alfred was bawling his eyes out to Matthew.

"I don't even know what I'm _doing!_ It's like I _know_ what I want to say, but I say the complete opposite! I knew Owain would come and have a word with me at _some_ point; I had a plan and everything! I was going to tell him how stupid I was and how much I regretted everything, but I just acted like a complete _idiot!"_ Alfred paused dramatically, blowing his nose, not caring about how his dignity was slowly draining away, "I want to make up with Arthur, I really do! But even if he forgives me, which isn't going to happen, there's no way his brothers are ever going to let me! They'll hate me forever! Oh god, even Ivy's gunna hate me…" he buried his face in his hands, "I fucked up."

Matthew sighed, patting Alfred on the back. He really regretted agreeing to help Alfred. Sure, he wanted to help a friend in need, but even though Matthew did look like a good listener, usually he just wanted to shout at the person and tell them to man up and grow a back bone.

Plastering on his usual smile, Matthew attempted to comfort the American, "Look, Alfie, I'm sure you can prove yourself to Arthur. Arthur will understand, right? And you aren't _completely_ to blame. Yeah, you said some really stupid things, and yeah, you probably shouldn't have shouted at Owain, but I think it's partly Arthur's fault too…"

"How so?"

"Well first of all, he does need to stop being so unstable," Matthew shrugged, "I don't want to sound harsh, but you can't be unconfident in a relationship – it just won't work," he knew that all too well. "And I guess he might've overreacted a _bit_…"

"Really?"

"Well it's not really my place to say, but I think he could've been a little more mature about the situation. I'm just saying what I think, though, I'm not saying you have to agree with me…"

Alfred didn't reply for a while, just thinking. He then came up with exactly what he needed to do, "I know what I'm going to do. I'll give Artie some time to calm down and stuff. But while he's sort of repairing himself, I'll do something big. Like real big to make him love me again."

"And what's that going to be?"

"… I don't know yet." Alfred carried on quickly, "But when I figure it out, before I even talk to Arthur, I'll explain everything to his brothers – I'll beg for their forgiveness – I'll let them attack me if they want to, which I'm sure Alastair will! And then… maybe it'll make everything okay again?"

Matthew smiled, "It's a good idea," he nodded, "Yeah. Go for it!"

"Thanks, Mattie! I really don't know what I'd do without you!" Alfred threw his arms around the Canadian, who struggled to get free.

"Oh come on, get off me you big idiot," Matthew grinned weakly, trying to shove Alfred's strong arms off him.

"Never! You will forever be mine!" Alfred laughed obnoxiously, and then stopped, looking straight at Matthew, "I only just noticed that you're really pretty. You're almost like a _girl_."

"Oh thanks, I love you too." Matthew narrowed his eyes, but had stopped struggling.

"You know what I mean! Like the way Owain looks like a girl."

"Please don't compare me to him." Matthew replied flatly.

"But you're both super-pretty. Like _really_ pretty." Alfred grinned roughly.

There was a silence between the two of them. Neither moved, so they were stuck in their half-hug, half wrestling-match position, just looking at one another.

And, for the second time that day, Matthew did something stupid.

He'd _sworn_ to stop kissing people that he wasn't dating. He really had! But he'd broken that rule an awful lot. He'd kissed Francis, he'd kissed Owain…

… And now he was kissing Alfred.

The two pulled away from the chaste kiss, neither saying a word. Alfred watched Matthew intently for a reaction, neither of them letting the other see past their intimidating poker face. When neither gave any reaction, Alfred leaned down for another kiss, and Matthew went along with it, gluing their lips together again.

Matthew didn't know what he was doing. He didn't know _why_ he was doing it. He just knew he was being really stupid, but that didn't stop him. In fact, the past week, it felt like the only person he _hadn't_ been kissing was the very person he was meant to be kissing. Gilbert. After every kind, romantic thing the German did for him, it still wasn't enough. Matthew _still_ did this.

Owain was right. He really was a slut.

* * *

Gilbert was sitting in his dorm, staring out the window lost in thought. It almost looked like he was trying to impersonate a love-struck protagonist, who relived their stress by looking out of the stars and dreaming of a new home. It was nothing as impressive or cliché like that, though. Gilbert just happened to be staring out of the window, and was too wrapped up in his own thoughts to notice Alastair coming through the door, flanked by Antonio.

"Gil? Gil, wake up, idiot. You've got guests," Alastair called, walking into the kitchen and helping himself to a coke. When Gilbert didn't respond, Alastair sighed, and grabbed an apple from his untouched fruit bowl, lobbing it at the German's head.

"What the _fuck_ was that for!?" Gilbert spun round, rubbing the back of his neck where the apple had hit him perfectly, "Hey Toni. Thanks for not throwing fruit at me like that idiot. And ask for food before you go taking it!" Gilbert complained as Alastair helped himself to an open packet of Doritos.

"Stop complaining," Alastair answered flatly, sinking down on to a chair opposite Gilbert's bed, issuing for Antonio to sit next to him. It'd been an accident that Antonio happened to be with them – Alastair just decided as part of Gilbert's trio, Antonio had a right to know about Gilbert's problems too. And they obviously couldn't tell Francis – that'd just cause problems for Owain.

"How's Matthew recently, Gil?" Alastair asked nonchalantly, crossing his legs.

"Great I guess, why?" Gilbert furrowed his brows.

Alastair pointed his finger accusingly at his albino friend, "That's a lie."

"What? What're you talking about?" Gilbert said, "Alastair, hurry up and tell me why you're here. I do have a life of my own."

"Yeah, and you spend it staring out of windows. I _know_ there's something up with you and Matthew. Why else would he be going around kissing other guys?" Alastair leaned back.

Both Gilbert and Antonio blinked, "What!?"

"You didn't know either?" Gilbert looked at Antonio, raising an eyebrow.

"No! I just tagged along because it looked fun!" Antonio held up his hand in a surrendering position, "I didn't know this was gunna come about! What's going on?"

Gilbert sighed, "Well, we haven't been talking a lot recently, I'll give you that. Or seeing each other much… It's been a while since I've kissed him either…" he looked up, not amused, "Oh. I get it. He's bored of me."

"Now, did I say that?" Alastair sighed, "The deal is, he's been flirting with Francis – I don't know how far they've gone… Owain's pretty sure they've _only_ been flirting, but you know the Frog… But earlier on… He kissed Owain too. But that wasn't romantic in any way. I told Owain this before – it was completely competitive. Like proving to each other that they were better."

Gilbert didn't say anything.

"You're not surprised?" Antonio asked, lightly resting a hand on Gilbert's shoulders.

Gilbert shook his head, "No. If I'm honest, I've been suspecting it for a while. Me and Matt don't even go on dates any more, y'know? Relationship's completely dead." Sighing deeply, he looked up to smile wryly at his friends, "I guess you can have too much of a good thing, right?"

"No. No. No. You are not going all smiley-smiley 'it's my entire fault on me' hero-protagonist-y on me now, Gil!" Alastair stood up, furrowing his eyebrows, "You have a right to get angry at him, and you need to go and break up with him _right now!_" he pointed at the door for good measure, "You're not letting him use you like that! You're _Gilbert!_ The old you wouldn't have let this happen! You'd screw with anyone who screwed with you first!"

"But…" Antonio frowned, "Maybe Gilbert's right not to get annoyed…"

"How can you say that, Toni!?" Alastair turned on the Spaniard.

"No, hear me out! If Gilbert confronted Matthew right now, then he'd know that Gilbert has been fed information behind the scenes, right? And that'd make him look like he's been spying on Matthew's every move! That'd be _really_ uncool. I think Gil should just wait and see if Matthew admits it himself…"

"But what if he doesn't?" Alastair demanded.

"Well, then he can break up with him! But I think to act now would be rash." Antonio said finally.

"I rest my case," Gilbert nodded, winking at Antonio in thanks, even though his reason for not wanting to get pissed at Matthew wasn't what Antonio had suggested.

Alastair frowned, "I don't like it. I think you should show him whose boss! This isn't just about your relationship – I think he's out to get every happy couple out there! He's going to break everyone up!" he turned to Antonio in a rush of insanity, "Keep your lips to yourself, Toni. Don't kiss _anyone. _Apart from Lovino."

Gilbert smiled slightly, "You overreact too much, Al. Mattie's just made a few mistakes, I wouldn't blame him!"

"Well who do we blame then!?" the Scottish boy threw his arms up in frustration.

"Do you have _proof_ that Mattie was the one to kiss Owain and it wasn't the other way around?"

"No, but…"

"Exactly. I'm not going to act until I know for sure." Gilbert furrowed his brows, "I just want to hold on to this 'relationship' as long as I can. I know it's pathetic, but I just want to keep Matthew for as long as I can. Can you let me manage my own life, please?"

Alastair frowned, "I was only trying to help…"

"I know you were, Al," Gilbert smiled, standing up, issuing for the two to follow him to the door, "I do appreciate it, I really do, but I think I need to figure this out for myself, yeah? And besides, Arthur needs more help than me right now – and Toni, Lovino's probably waiting for you in a sexual position on your bed or whatever you two get up to. Off you go."

"But Gil! We're not done talking to you!" Antonio complained, Alastair trying to wrestle his way back through the door that Gilbert was trying to shove him through.

"I'm done talking to you, though," Gilbert sighed, "Look, you two, I'm glad you're trying to help me, but please can you come back tomorrow or something? I need some thinking time!"

Pushing two pairs of arms through the final crack of the door and ignoring their cries of complaint from Antonio and Alastair, Gilbert finally shut the door on his two best friends. Sinking down to the floor, Gilbert rested his head in his hands, pulling his knees up to his chest. It was sweet that his friends worried about him – the only reason he'd wrestled them out so hastily was that he could feel a rush of tears trying to escape, and he didn't want to cry in front of Alastair, who froze at the sight of watery eyes, or Antonio, who'd probably start crying too.

Ahh… Gilbert thought to himself. There came the tears.

**A/N**

**Hey people :D  
Oh god D: first day back to school toady X'D turns out on a Wednesday I have three lessons of science. Three. God save me. XD  
So, with school, sadly this means less updates (probably D:) I'm sorry guys!  
Thank you very much for reviews, and I hope you review if you liked this chapter! :D  
Also, this story will have a happy USUK ending :D I can't be too sure about the other pairings though, but everyone _will_ be happy :'D  
Thanks, guys!**


	9. The Teacher's Lounge

**Chapter nine – The Teacher's Lounge**

"So class, _that_ is how to chat someone up in German. Class dismissed!"

Mathias Køhler was settling into his position at Goverek High School nicely. He'd befriended many of the teachers – even a few of the students, and as far as he knew, everyone was enjoying their German lessons. The boys certainly seemed to enjoy the one he'd just taught, anyway.

But now was lunch break. Lunch break meant the teacher's lounge.

Everyone seemed to assume that the teacher's lounge was a lovely place to unwind – drink away your problems with coffee or tea, and lightly socialise with your colleagues. Perhaps normal teacher's lounges were like that in _normal_ schools, but the day Goverek fell under the category 'normal' would be the day the queen of England decided that unicorns would now be the transport for the military. Goverek's teacher's lounge was probably one of the scariest, most dangerous places to be in the entire school.

Which was one of the reasons Mathias loved it so much!

Whistle tunelessly on his way down, the German teacher came very close to crashing into a certain ICT teacher who was just locking up his classroom.

"Lukas! I didn't know you'd started your job already – Tino told me you were starting next week!" Mathis clapped the Norwegian on the back, grinning as they made their way to the teacher's lounge.

"Yeah, I told him to tell you that…" Lukas glared up at Mathis, frowning.

"Aww! Now why'd you do that?" Mathis pouted.

"So I could avoid you for another week." Lukas said flatly, ignoring Mathis' dramatic act of fainting from shock.

Realising that Lukas wasn't going to come and pick him up of the floor, Mathis jumped to his feet, running to catch up with his colleague, "You're no fun, Lukas," he pouted childishly, "You look so adorable and friendly, but when you open your mouth you freeze everyone with your frosty words! If only I could warm you up a bit more…" Mathis made to hug Lukas, but Lukas very easily stepped out of his grasp, causing Mathis to fall to the floor again.

After getting himself up and running alongside Lukas again, Mathis decided to make light conversation, "So what about your brother? Has he started his job here, too?"

Lukas shrugged, "Yeah, I guess."

"What was he teaching again?"

"Geography."

Mathis frowned, "I'm trying to make conversation with you, but you're so _flat!_ At this rate we'll have to walk in silence!"

"By all means."

And walk in painful silence the two did.

Soon, however, they reached the teacher's lounge. Stepping inside, Mathis had to dodge a tennis ball that had been thrown across the room by someone.

"Sorry, I was aiming for Braginski…" Yao Wang frowned, making to pick up the tennis ball, "I've never been too good at throwing."

"S'fine, Professor," Mathis beamed, "We all want to throw a tennis ball at him sometimes, don't we?"

"You have no idea, Mathis. And please, call me Yao," Yao smiled, and then went to make himself some tea.

"Did someone say my name?" none other than Ivan Braginski turned around, murderous smile on his face. Yao, who was mid-walking-away froze, cursing to himself in Chinese.

"You know, Yao, it's not nice to throw things at people…" Ivan pouted a little, "It would hurt my feelings to know you want to hurt me…"

It felt like the whole room was now glaring at the Coach, "Cut out the cute act, Braginski, we all know you're a psychopath behind your cute smile." Elizabeta spoke up bravely.

"Aww, you found me out~" he chuckled all too happily, "Oh well!"

Yao cursed again, and then went off to make his tea and socialise with Mei Wan, the art teacher.

Lukas frowned, leaving Mathis' side and walking over to the corner of the room to sit with a very familiar looking man.

"Emil!" Mathis called, seeing just who Lukas had been so eager to get to, "It's been too long!"

"On the contrary," Emil frowned, "It hasn't been long enough."

Mathis frowned, but before he could complain, a voice cut across him.

"Hey you guys! It's been too long!"

The whole room fell silent as Tino and Berwald made their way through the crowds. Everyone was staring intently at Berwald, frozen in motion. It wasn't as if this was the first time they'd seen Berwald – it was quite often he made his way into the teacher's lounge and demolished all conversation, but he always managed to freeze the entire room for at least a few minutes. Everyone was so _scared_ of him.

"Hey Tino!" Mathis waved, but was blanked completely as the Finnish man attacked the brothers with a hug.

"I'm so glad you made it across okay. How was the plane journey? There wasn't too much turbulence, was there? Berwald and I flew through a thunderstorm over German – it was terrifying! Oh! I'm blabbing, aren't I? So how's your first day been so far?"

"Boring." The pair answered in unison.

Tino smiled a little awkwardly, realising that it'd be impossible to get these two to have a conversation that lasted over one line, "Ah… That's… nice, isn't it?"

"'S a lost cause, Tino," Berwald shook his head, "G've up."

"You two're a new, eh?" Elizabeta made her way over, huge grin on her face, "Why don't you introduce yourselves to your colleagues?"

"They're Emil Steilsson and Lukas Bondevik. Emil's in geography, Lukas for ICT. They're brothers, and I would appreciate it if you stopped hassling them, Miss Héderváry."

The entire population of the room turned to the door, once again freezing their conversations when they saw Mr. Belischmidt glowering at the Hungarian from the doorway.

Elizabeta frowned, "I was simply making conversation. And I've told you, Legolas, call me Elizabeta!"

"And I've told you, Miss Héderváry," Mr. Belischmidt frowned, "Call me Mr. Belischmidt."

"One day, one day, Legolas," Elizabeta sat back down next to Roderich, "I _will_ dislodge that stick from your ass."

Mr. Belischmidt blushed a little, coughing, "I assure you, there is no need for you to 'dislodge' anything."

The room giggled a little at the innuendo statement, but with a glare from their boss everyone went back to sipping their drinks nervously.

"I just came in here to make a quick announcement," Mr. Belischmidt glared at the room, "There will be a meeting tomorrow lunchtime. That is all." And with that final statement, the Headmaster slammed the door shut, and everyone let out a sigh of relief in perfect unison.

"That stick will be mine…" Elizabeta muttered under her breath.

"Give it up, Lizzy," Mr. Vargas piped up from the coffee machine, "That stick's been up there so long there's no chance of ever getting it out."

Roderich coughed lightly, "I think this conversation is a little inappropriate, if you ask me."

"No one _did _ask you, though…" Mr. Vargas muttered, rolling his eyes.

Back in the 'Scandinavian Corner' as it was already being referred to, the two new members of staff were getting quite a bit of attention from other teachers. The only problem was the fact that they didn't really _want_ the attention, so ended up just letting Tino and Mathis answer for them.

"If you're brothers, why are your surnames different?" Miss Chernenko asked, tilting her head.

"Apparently it's because they were brought up by separate families. We're not even sure _ourselves_. These two are a bit of a mystery.

"So were you five all friends before working here?"

"Yeah, well… Kind of," Tino smiled, "Mathis and I have a bit of a… history. We used to be pretty close in school, but when it came to university, I moved back to Finland. Berwald was pretty friendly with us both in high school, but when I flew back home to go to university… he kind of… came with me. Then Mathis met these two," Tino nodded towards Emil and Lukas, "In his university, and ever since we've been meeting up as often as we can. We're pretty close friends."

"That's so sweet!" Miss Chernenko smiled warmly, "So… you say Berwald _followed_ you… Are you… gay, then?"

"Who said gay!?" Elizabeta jumped up, eyes gleaming.

"These two! They're a couple!" Miss Chernenko smiled, pointing to Berwald and Tino.

Elizabeta ran over, grabbing both of their hands, shaking them, "Tino, you are so very cute. Berwald," she managed to look the scary man right in the eyes, "You got a good catch. Expect to see more of me."

"N-no…! We're nothing l-like that…" Tino stuttered, blushing, "R-really…"

Berwald frowned, "How c'n you say th't? You're m'wife." He declared flatly.

Tino positively _glowed, "Berwald!_ Be quiet!"

As Berwald kept insisting about his marriage status, Miss Chernenko and Elizabeta smiled to one another.

"I'd better get a picture of this… Ivy would love to hear about it…" Elizabeta grinned, snapping a quick picture with her mobile.

"You're still in touch with Ivy? Ivy Kirkland?" Roderich raised an eyebrow.

"What other Ivy do you know?" Elizabeta laughed, "Yeah, she's one of my best friends! Why?"

Roderich shook his head, "I was only wondering."

"She's been really supportive with the baby and everything," Elizabeta said, "She knows I'm terrible with this sort of thing…"

"Well, she would have a lot of experience," Roderich said under his breath, frowning as he went back to a paper he was marking. Before Elizabeta could ask him what on earth he was talking about, the rooms attention was caught by the raised voice of Yao from the area nearest the kettle.

"Oh yeah, how is Ivy?" Mr. Vargas said, sitting down next to Elizabeta, "What happened after the issues with Daniel?"

Elizabeta shrugged, "He was harassing her all last year, that bastard. He seems to have laid off a little now, but you never can be too sure with that man. Last I heard she's dating a new guy."

"What, another one?" Roderich narrowed his eyes, "She really needs to get her act together."

"No! It's good for her – she just needs to relax a little," Elizabeta held Roderich's arm soothingly, "I know you worry, but you can be a little mean about it at times. And for a heads up, don't tell the kids."

"Who, the Kirklands? Why not?" Mr. Vargas interrupted.

"Ivy didn't seem too keen on them finding out, y'know? It's not because she doesn't want them to find out about him, as such, but it's more that if they find out, they'll be… a little… protective… Or we can predict they'll act that way…"

"Well I could imagine Alastair especially wouldn't be too pleased…" Roderich muttered, imagining the rage of the Scot if he ever did find out. Scary thought.

"Exactly. So keep your mouths shut!" Elizabeta winked.

Before too long, the room's attention was once again pulled over to a concentrated spot. This time it was Ivan and Yao in the spotlight.

"Coach, I'd greatly appreciate it if you could stop touching me." Yao muttered through gritted teeth, trying to keep his composure.

"Aww, but you're cute, Yao. You look very breakable, but I'll be as gentle as I can…" Ivan said with a hint of creepiness in his tone.

Grabbing Ivan's hand and throwing it off his shoulder where it'd been snaking, Yao set down his tea, "Ivan! _Stop feeling me up!"_

Ivan's smile widened, "You called me by my first name. You never usually do that."

Yao blinked a few times. He'd tried to get the point across to Ivan that they _were not_ on a first name basis. Annoyingly out of his own rash anger, he'd completely forgotten about calling the man 'Coach' or 'Braginski', "Ehh… That's because…" Yao tried to search for an excuse, refusing to admit defeat, "Because I want you to take me seriously! This is no laughing matter!"

"Right…" Ivan smiled up at Yao, not believing a word he said, "You can be really cute at times, you know!"

"_Be quiet!"_ Yao insisted, trying to shove Ivan away from him as the Russian wrapped his arms around Yao's feminine figure.

"Just like a woman!" Ivan said, "You should crossdress some time…"

"_I am not going to crossdress!"_

"Aww, not even if I paid you?"

_"I'm not a prostitute!"_

"It'd be hot if you were… Then you couldn't escape me…" Ivan muttered, blowing lightly on Yao's neck, causing the man beneath him to shudder.

"Braginski! I have told you this on numerous occasions – I'm _not gay_." Yao insisted, "Sure – in my early years I was bi-curious… at times – but I like women!"

Ivan's smirk turned a little darker, "You didn't tell me that on the night you were drunk in that science classroom…"

Yao flushed crimson, "I told you! That was a mistake! I was drunk – _you took advantage over me!"_

There was a pause.

"You two've had sex!?" Elizabeta demanded, jumping to her feet, staring at the two of them.

Ivan cut across Yao's stream of denial with a simple "Yes!"

Elizabeta very nearly collapsed into a pool of her own blood, "Where? When? _Why!?"_

"Let's see…" Ivan muttered, casually muffling Yao's protests by clamping a huge hand over his mouth, keeping the Chinese man in his vice-like grip, "We did it twice, actually… There was once about a year and a half ago, and then the more recent time… two weeks ago. Both times were in Yao's classroom – first desk you see when you walk in… And the reason…" he pondered for a second, "Because I was horny and he was drunk." He decided with a smile.

Elizabeta grinned, "Braginski, I knew you were a bastard – but I never knew you were a gay one. Come here, man," she held her arms open for a hug, "Seriously awesome. Give me pictures next time."

Ivan hugged her, still keeping a tight hold of Yao, "I have some with me if you'd like to see them?"

"Seriously!? Gimme, gimme!" Elizabeta fretted, grinning as he routed in his pockets, and handed them to her. Very soon, Elizabeta was sitting next to Roderich, fanning herself.

Yao, who'd finally been released from Ivan's grasp, was fuming.

"You can't go around giving away pictures of me!" Yao had already attempted to grab the pictures off Elizabeta. But no one, not even Ivan, could get those pictures off her now, "And you can't take pictures of me in the first place! When the hell did I say you could take them!? And why do you keep them in your pockets! What if a student found them!?"

Ivan smiled, "One already has."

"_What!?"_

"Don't worry! I told him that if he ever told anyone, I'd kill him and his family."

"That's a little drastic…"

"And for your information, you did ask me to take those pictures. Actually you pretty much begged me to 'preserve your slutty face for eternity'." Ivan's smile was all-too-pleased at Yao's increasing blush.

"I was intoxicated when saying that!" Yao cursed in Chinese under his breath, "Tell _no one_ of this!" he addressed not only Ivan, but the whole room, who he'd now realised had been listening to every word that had been said.

The room nodded, muttering 'yes'-es, but everyone knew that this news would spread.

Ivan sighed, "Aw,, I've got to go an set up for my next class… Useless children…" he muttered, sentence turning darker as it went on. He was soon back to speaking in his usual bright tone, "Bye Yao~"

Before anyone could do anything, Ivan leaned in swiftly, pinning Yao against the wall and stole a very quick kiss. Just because the kiss was quick didn't mean it was chaste. On the contrary – Yao felt like the kiss could've been classed as explicit content alone! Ivan's tongue managed to snake inside Yao's mouth and fight with his own, and the Russain gently nipped at Yao's bottom lip, before finally separating, uncaring of his taken aback colleagues or the flashes of Elizabeta's camera.

"See you after school, Yao~" Ivan sang, passing Mr. Belischmidt on his way out as the bell for afternoon lessons began.

"I'm not even going to ask…" Mr. Belischmidt muttered, picking up the book he needed from the coffee table, and running out before he got involved with the fanatics of his employees.

**A/N**

**Short. I know. Don't kill me X'D I was gunna do a page break and continue writing, but then I realised a new chapter would be a little more suiting XD don't worry – I'm in the middle of writing the next chapter, so that should be up quite soon X'D  
So! Everyone should be back in school now, I guess… I'm sorry if the delay between chapters is a little longer than usual – I've just entered Year 10 (same year as Alfie and Artie) and that's our first exam year, which means _a lot_ of homework. Already I've had quite a bit Q_Q usually it woldn't be much of a problem – but there's subjects like art which have really time-consming homework X'D so between getting back to school, my birthday, and numerous other little problems (*coughcough* my laziness *coughcough*) It's taken me a while with this chapter X'D so I hope you liked!  
See ya soon, guys! Also, Love you if you've reviewed! Please review if you enjoyed! Thank yous!**


	10. Dreams? More like nightmares

**Chapter ten – Dreams? More like nightmares**

Arthur and Alfred still weren't talking. It was a few days after the heated break-up at the start of the week. That also meant it was a few days after Matthew's little kissing session with both Owain and Alfred. It was fair enough to say that quite a few people had quite a few problems to deal with. In fact, an awful lot more than you'd think.

Of course, there was Arthur worrying that he'd be forever alone, and that he'd live in a house with twenty five cats. Then Alfred's worries about turning into a moody dickhead, and his additional worries about kissing Matthew and what strings he'd gotten caught up in there. Owain was worried about Francis finding out about him kissing Matthew, while Francis was worried about Owain finding out about _him_ kissing Matthew. Alastair was pissed at the world and the fact that it felt like no one loved him, and wouldn't stop moping about the fact he was single. Matthew was worried about turning into a heartless slut, or that he'd maybe even turned into one already. Gilbert was fretting about forever falling in love with people that would never really love him back, and was constantly arguing with himself about whether or not to confront Matthew about their situation or not. Kiku was _not_ looking forward to English, which was first lesson tomorrow morning, as it would involve being taught by his incredibly sexy ex, Heracles Karpusi, and would be more than a little awkward. Ludwig was trying to choose between his work, and spending time with Feliciano, while Feliciano was constantly trying to figure out that on the rare occasions when he _did_ spend time with Ludwig if it was interrupting anything the German could be doing.

So there was a fair amount of worry, a little bit of anger, a sprinkle of angst and self-hatred, and that was pretty much the situation at Goverek high school.

Naturally with all these problems and numerous others floating around in the heads of the pupils, patience was short. A lot of arguments had broken out between friends that would never usually think of arguing with one another over stupid things, like whose pencil was sharpest. Alastair and Owain had had quite a few unusual tiffs in the past few days, the main subject being Francis. Even Feliciano had snapped at Ludwig once or twice. No one thought it'd been possible for Feliciano to _snap_. Kiku had been rude to teachers, Matthew had sworn at a year seven. It felt like they were in a parallel universe.

On top of the worries and the arguments, there was an infinite amount of classwork and homework to be getting on with. By 'infinite', I mean, once a student had _finally_ finished their huge pile of homework, they handed it into their teacher, and they were given _another_ huge pile of homework to complete. And so on went this insane cycle. But, because boys will be boys no matter what, a lot of them found they left their homework to the last minute, which meant they did it at night. Which meant they had a lack of sleep – with a lack of sleep, not only did this make them more that a little irritable, but this caused their immune to be running a little low, which caused a lot of the boys to catch colds.

So to summarise – the majority of the boys in Year 10 and Year 11 were worrying about their social life, arguing with their friends and/or girlfriends or boyfriends, worrying about not getting their homework done in time, or failing their class completely, constantly tired and run down, and sneezing constantly throughout.

What a _wonderful_ life.

Arthur was quite fed up of it.

Alfred was quite fed up with it.

In fact, pretty much every student – if not every student, unless they were creepily masochistic, was completely fed up with their system. They wanted to quit the work, make up with their friends, recharge their batteries and just _relax_. They couldn't even recharge at weekends – they were too busy completing all of their homework! When they weren't doing that, they were arguing. It was a terrible vicious circle that pretty much every student alive has fallen into, or come pretty close to falling into.

"I just want to _sleep,"_ Arthur muttered to himself, rubbing his eyes, and willing himself to stay awake as he copied out quadratic equations.

"I know the feeling…" Owain muttered from beside him, who was working on his _Othello_ essay.

"_Oui, oui,"_ Francis whispered hoarsely – he'd been coughing all day and was now working on his biology assignment.

Arthur had continued to share a room with Owain and Francis while he was on bad ground with Alfred. Neither of the boys minded, really, though Francis had been known to kick up a fuss now and then about how untidy Arthur was. Now though, the three of them were simply too tired to argue. They were too tired to do _anything_. Francis and Owain hadn't gone on a date in a while – breaching Francis' policy of 'at least one date a week'.

"I'm going to bed. I don't care if I fail… I just need to _live_…" Owain grumbled sleepily, falling into bed, not even bothering to kick his shoes off.

"I agree, _mon cher_…" Francis moaned, flopping beside the already asleep Welsh boy.

Arthur rolled his eyes at the two, determined to finish his maths before he slept. He could do it. He knew he could! _Come on, Arthur, come on!_

He felt his pencil falling loose in his grasp, very nearly drifting off. He shook himself awake, and realised happily that he was writing down the final problem. Sadly, this problem was the longest, and by all means the most difficult and complex. The last questions always are.

Arthur worked his way through the problem, his brain groaning at him the whole time for his hand to have mercy and stop using up all his energy and just let him _sleep_. Finally, with an unenthusiastic flourish, Arthur underlined the final answer, and very nearly jumped for joy – he probably would have if he'd had more energy.

His happiness didn't last long. He soon realised that the answer he'd put just _didn't_ make sense – it completely contradicted an earlier point in the equation. Arthur wanted to throw something. Gritting his teeth and feebly beginning to rub the mistake out, he sighed, and began doing the equation all over again.

Halfway through, though, his pencil fell slack, and his head bumped down on the desk, the weak light casting shadows all over his face. He wasn't asleep – more dozing, but even so, vivid images were dancing around in his mind. Dreams flooded his vision – but they were the worst kind of dream. It was the type of dream you get when you're half-awake, and things just _don't_ make sense, and everything seems exaggerated.

Arthur's dream was, as it had been an awful lot recently, starring Alfred F. Jones. He was partly thankful for it, partly ripping his hair out. It showed him how much he did miss Alfred, despite he was telling himself that he could manage without the American. Though of course, everyone _knew_ Arthur missed Alfred and vice versa. But _no_, Arthur was just too _insecure_ for Alfred, apparently. Too much of a _girl_.

In this dream, Alfred was asleep. Just sleeping. The semi-awake Arthur began muttering inaudible things aloud that were _meant_ to be attempts to get the dream-Alfred to wake up. In the dream he was having, he was actually speaking very clearly – Alfred was responding to his calls.

Dream-Alfred rubbed his eyes, obviously awake, and began walking closer and closer to Dream-Arthur. Alfred had a smile on his face, but Arthur couldn't place what the smile displayed. It wasn't happiness, or laughter… but it didn't look like a sarcastic or cruel smile either. It was just a _smile_.

And then, Dream-Alfred began to whisper something. A very long something, and a very, _very_ quiet something. Arthur found he had to move up right close to Alfred's face to hear.

Arthur was a little shocked to hear that Alfred was muttering _nothing_. It was complete mumbo-jumbo. A long stream of words all sewn messily together by random sentences, all in all making no sense.

Wait, Arthur told himself, Something Alfred was saying seemed to make a little bit of sense.

"_One minute you're all over me, the next you think I'm dating you for a joke, and the minute after that you're in a world of your own!"_

Oh no, no, no. Arthur did _not _want to hear this again! He'd heard it once before, and he did _not_ want Alfred to say it again!

"_Then you try to make it better and treat me like a girl. I'm not a girl. Perhaps if you can't accept that, you should go over to Coverack and take your pick out of the girls there"_

Arthur covered his ears, trying to shout loudly to not hear Alfred. But logic doesn't apply to dreams – frustratingly, Alfred's voice just got louder and louder like it was being amplified in his head. Arthur began screaming back apologies, insults, explanations, _anything_ at Alfred. The American didn't respond and just carried on with his words. Arthur began backing away, trying to escape, but in that frustrating, dream-like way, his feet felt like they were made out of lead. They weren't moving _anywhere_. Alfred began moving closer to Arthur, and Arthur didn't want to know what would happen next. He tried to block out the one-sided conversation again, but it was as useless as before. Alfred got closer and closer, Arthur tried shouting louder and louder.

But, Dream-Arthur didn't experience anything as painful as he thought he might've. Dream-Alfred didn't attack him like Arthur had suspected him to do. He didn't do anything, in fact. He just stared at Arthur's eyes, and then muttered a part of the argument that Arthur definitely hadn't heard before.

"I'm sorry." Dream-Alfred said, and then hugged Dream-Arthur.

With a jolt, the real Arthur sprung awake, his whole body jumping and his head shooting up off his desk. He groaned, rubbing his eyes and checking the clock. It was half two in the morning – he'd been asleep for about fifteen minutes. Shaking his head, Arthur closed his book and stumbled over to his bed. He'd have to do it in the morning, he told himself.

Sadly, though, even when trying to sleep he couldn't relax. His thoughts were full of his little dream. He knew it hadn't really meant much, but it did confuse him. It mad no sense that Alfred would shout at him, and then hug him and forgive him. Call Arthur sentimental, but he believed that all dreams were dreamt for a reason – not to say that they were to predict anything or something like that – no, more that they weren't as random as some people thought they were, and that, in each dream, there were your key thoughts all scrambled up into one confusing ball. The hard part was to separate the feelings.

Annoyingly, Arthur didn't need an oneirologist to tell him that he missed Alfred.

* * *

Meanwhile, Alfred and Matthew were sprawled out across Alfred's bed. Unlike every single one of their classmates, they'd left their homework in a neat pile, untouched. Whether it was a rebellious phase, or that Alfred was trying to prove something by not doing his homework, Matthew didn't know, but he more than happily copied Alfred.

"So why aren't you sleeping with Gilbert?" Alfred muttered into the darkness, yawning a little.

"Dunno. He's being weird with me. I knew we weren't really… _okay_… but, he's acting like I've done something terrible…" Matthew muttered.

"Well you kinda _have_, remember?"

"Yeah, but Gilbert doesn't know about that…" Matthew muttered, "Or he _shouldn't_. Maybe someone told him. It wasn't you was it!?"

"No!" Alfred cried, a little annoyed that Matthew might suspect him.

Matthew sighed, "Sorry… So, why'd you break up with Arthur again?"

Alfred shut up, frowning.

"Oh come on, you can tell me."

"Because I was stupid – I woke up, and I was annoyed with myself, and I took it out on Arthur." Alfred explained flatly, gritting his teeth.

"Why were you in a bad mood with yourself?"

"I had a stage dream."

"What was it?"

"Will you _ever_ stop asking questions!?" Alfred asked, only half-serious, "I can't remember…"

"Yes you can!" Matthew insisted with a grin.

Alfred sighed again, "Fine, fine, but you can't tell anyone."

Matthew matched Alfred's sigh, "_Fine_."

Alfred rolled his eyes, and then remembered that Matthew wouldn't be able to see him in the dark, "Well… I kinda dreamt that… I don't even know. It was a weird, kinda twisted dream."

"Come on, you can tell me!"

"Bear with me a minute, will you?" Alfred said, "I… was like… I don't even know. Some sort of man-whore? It was like I was one of those guys you see with big-boobed girls surrounding him 24/7… But… Ehh… I wasn't surrounded by big boobs…" Alfred muttered, now feeling a little embarrassed, "It… was you guys…"

"What?" Matthew asked, genuinely confused.

Alfred shook his head, "I told you, I don't know! Like you, Kiku, Owain, Feliciano, Lovino – all the people that I've found… mildly attractive in the past."

"You've found me 'mildly attractive'!?" Matthew blinked, quite pleased with himself, "Wait. You found _Lovino_ mildly attractive!?"

"If he shut his mouth, then he'd be cute," Alfred pouted in self-defence, "But that's not the point here, you idiot! I had a dream about girly-guys—"

"Watch it." Matthew warned, glaring.

"Sorry," Alfred corrected himself, "_Pretty boys_, then, drooling all over me in, like… _no clothes_. And Arthur wasn't there! I didn't even think about him! And it was one of the best dreams I've ever had! It was seriously screwed-up!"

"But it was hot?"

"Hotter than the fucking sun." Alfred answered guiltily.

"Swearing doesn't suit you…" Matthew muttered.

"That's not the point – what am I meant to do?" Alfred rubbed his eyes, trying to stay awake.

Matthew thought for a moment, "Well you don't need to do anything now, do you? You've already screwed things up with Arthur—"

"Thanks, man."

"Let me finish," Matthew said patiently, "You've already messed up there, so why bother dwelling over that? So you had a wet dream about me and some other guys getting it on with you. Why does that matter? It was only a _dream_. It doesn't really mean anything," Matthew shrugged, "Rather than worrying about that stuff, you should be thinking about how to fix things."

Alfred sighed, "I know, I _want_ to… I just can't."

"And why not?"

"Because he _hates_ me, maybe?" Alfred deadpanned, frowning in the dark, "Even if I did apologise, it'd be useless."

Matthew suddenly felt a wave of annoyance, "Alfred F. Jones. You are determined. You are fearless. And right now, this is _definitely_ not you! For God's sake, wake _up!_ Arthur isn't going to waltz back into your arms. You'll need to work to get him back! You didn't have to do much at the start of your relationship – all you had to do was accept him. Now it's _your_ turn to do the wooing. You need to convince Arthur to come back to you. And I am _not_ letting you give up that easily!"

Alfred sat there for a second, a little stunned at Matthew's enthusiastic outburst.

"No." Alfred answered flatly, turning over in his covers.

"_What!?"_

"I don't want to," Alfred said, and then explained himself, "Loads of people have relationships that don't work, Matthew. This is just another one of those. Me and Arthur aren't a pair of star-crossed lovers that fate loves to play with! We're just two people that happened to date, _and it didn't work_."

"So you're telling me that you're going to let a year-and-a-bit long relationship crumble over a dream?" Matthew said, not attempting to mask the unimpressed tone in his voice.

"Yeah, but it _wasn't_ a year-and-a-bit long relationship, Mattie," Alfred sighed, "We started dating too young – it wasn't _dating_, it was friendship, but with an allowance of hand-holding and other cute stuff like that. A _relationship_ is something that hurts, and is complicated, and right now I don't really wanna be in one, get me?"

Matthew shook his head, "What _happened _to you?"

"What?"

"You… You really changed…" Matthew muttered, sounding almost a little hurt as his eyebrows knitted together, "You were never like this. I don't know what happened… But this isn't you. I don't like it."

Alfred scowled, "Well get used to it. This is me."

Matthew sighed, "Whatever."

There was an awkward silence for a moment or two as the boys settled down into more comfortable positions in their respected beds.

"Night…" Alfred muttered, suddenly feeling a little bad.

Either Matthew was already asleep, or he had chosen to ignore Alfred.

* * *

Despite it being the third English lesson he'd had this week, Kiku still froze when faced with the large wooden door.

Kiku had done his best to sink into the crowd with his English lessons. They hadn't been as terrible as he'd imagined them to be. Heracles, or as he'd been known recently, 'Mr. Karpusi', or usually plain old 'sir', had pretty much ignored him. Kiku was thankful for this – he knew that he and Heracles had left on a somewhat open note, but Heracles was going _so_ far as to not bring attention to Kiku, Kiku was beginning to wonder if Heracles actually knew he was in his class.

However, Kiku soon realised that Heracles knew he existed, and also that Heracles was having fun playing with his power.

"Sit down, no talking," he addressed his class flatly but not harshly – it simply sounded like he was tired, "Today we'll be reading through Act Two, Scene Two of Romeo and Juliet. As you all know, this coming November you'll all be doing a controlled assessment on this very play, so be sure to take notes. We'll first read through the scene, and then discuss about certain points that you'll want to mention in your exam. Questions?"

No one raised their hand.

"Good. Now, I'll need a few help with readers for certain parts. In this scene, Romeo has the most lines, so I'll be reading that. I need a Juliet."

Everyone shut up. Yes, half of them were show offs and loved reading allowed. Yes, most of them were hopeless romantics and loved nothing better than the soppy balcony scene in such a famous play. And yes, most of them in the room were gay, but not a single one of them in the room wanted to read out Juliet's lines.

"No one? Okay, Jones," Heracles looked over at Alfred, who was sitting at the front of the class, a row in front of him – as far away from Arthur as he possibly could, Kiku noticed. "Give me a number between one and thirty."

Alfred furrowed his brow in confusion, "Ten?" he tried, still baffled.

"Thank you," Heracles nodded, and then began counting the heads of students, making his way up the rows. Suddenly the students realised it was almost like a game of eeny-meeny-miny-mo. The tenth student to be pointed at would be unlucky enough to read aloud Juliet's lines.

Kiku _knew_ he should've saluted to those magpies he saw that morning…

"Nine…" Heracles counted Owain, who was sitting nervously next to Kiku, letting out a sigh of relief when he realised he wasn't the victim, and then Heracles' eyes rested on the Japanese boy, "And ten. We've found our Juliet."

Kiku wanted to hide under the desk. Why did this have to happen to _him?_ He made a mental note to never tell Lars of this.

"Let us begin then." Heracles smiled a little at the class, "Don't forget about your notes, class.

"_He jests at scars that never felt a wound…"_

Kiku had never had such an impulse to swear before in his life.

**A/N**

**I'd be lying if I said I didn't take inspiration from my everyday life X'D  
I hope you liked the chapter :D Thank you for reviews/faves/follows – anything XD love you guys!  
I'll try to update soon – and remember, always have faith in the USUK pairing X'D it will be a happy ending! :'D  
Thanks you guys!  
ALSO. Anyone going to London Comic Con at the end of October? Tell me if ya wanna meet :'D  
Over and out!**


	11. Kissing, biting, sex and dragons

**Chapter eleven – Kissing, biting, sex and dragons**

Kiku wasn't quite sure what had happened, but his English lesson had taken a quite drastic turn, and merged into a drama lesson.

Heracles had decided for 'added effect', he and Kiku would have to act out the scene rather than just reading the lines aloud. Also, the original scene they were going to read out was 'too boring', so they'd skipped right to the end, where Romeo and Juliet die for one another.

Kiku wished that he could kill _himself_.

He was lying on a table that they were now using as Juliet's deathbed. Heracles was reading out Romeo's lines of distress for finding his dear Juliet dead. Kiku, with his eyes closed and unenthusiastically pretending to be dead could feel Heracles above him – though he wasn't quite sure. It was _extremely_ unnerving, especially as he was aware that the entire class watching their 'acting'.

Heracles, who was coming to the end of his monologue paused in his well-known lines, pretending to drink poison, Kiku could only assume.

"_O true apothecary! Thy drugs are quick. Thus with a kiss I die."_ Heracles fell dramatically (Kiku was peeking through a crack in his eyes) but on his way down to the floor he grabbed Kiku's hand, kissing it passionately before falling to the floor.

Burning brightly, Kiku remembered suddenly that it was his turn to kill himself. He rose from the table, stuttering his lines. While he read from the script in front of him, his eyes darted around the classroom – terrified of what his classmates might think of him.

The disgust and annoyance he expected to see on his friend's faces wasn't there. Arthur was smirking a little, looking torn between collapsing into laughter or dying of the cuteness of the situation. Alfred looked pretty impressed too, he was even blushing a little. Feliciano caught Kiku's eye and gave an enthusiastic thumbs up, and Ludwig looked up from his notes, smiling at his friend. Even Francis, Antonio and Gilbert were showing their support, each looking very close to either swooning and nose-bleeding until there was no blood left in them (Francis and Antonio) or like their urge to burst into hysterics was dangerous. Kiku blushed a little; at least his classmates weren't judging him.

Although perhaps they might after what was going to come next, he corrected his thoughts, glancing to the bottom of the page and seeing just what he had to do next.

"_What's here? A cup, closed in my true love's hand? Poison, I see, hath been his timeless end. O churl! Drunk all, and left no friendly drop to help me after? I will kiss thy lips, haply some poison yet doth hang on them, to make me die with a restorative._

Kiku took a deep breath, glancing at the stage direction for a final time. A very clear '_Kisses him'_ was printed in the ink. It was bad enough having Heracles kiss his hand – at least he could claim that he had no control over the teacher's actions. But by kissing _Heracles_ – on the lips no less – then that would force him to join the guilty party. He should just skip the kiss.

Then, Kiku thought to himself, if he was going to skip it, why was he leaning toward Heracles as if going to kiss him?

He could just straighten up and walk right out of the classroom if he wanted to. It was detention of public humiliation. Detention would always win.

Still he kept inching closer, though.

Kiku knew _why_ he was inching closer, of course. He wasn't in denial – he knew that a part of him had been waiting for this kiss for a long time. He was aching to kiss Heracles, and had been ever since they'd broken up all that time ago. And now, when the chance had presented it's self to him, he was hesitating.

_Oh for God's sake_, Kiku's reckless side said – Kiku never really listened to his reckless side. It was too… well, reckless. _Just kiss him!_

For the first time in a while, Kiku decided his reckless side was right.

He lent down to Heracles, and gently pressed his lips to the other man's supposedly dead lips. It felt perfect and immoral both at the same time – Kiku didn't understand, but he knew he wished he could carry on doing it.

Mentally slapping himself, he pulled away. _I have a boyfriend!_ He reminded himself, annoyed. Taking a deep breath he glanced down at his script, and finished the play as casually as he could, pretending to stab himself, and fell on top of Heracles.

He stayed there for a moment for 'added effect' – most definitely _not_ because he liked the feeling of Heracles next to him – and heard Heracles whisper to him very softly.

"You did great," the teacher said, and then hoisted himself up, dragging Kiku up with him and taking a swooping bow. The class clapped politely – a few of them like Alfred or Feliciano shouting out chants of encouragement to Kiku. Hurriedly, Kiku ran back to his seat, blushing bright red and staring at the floor. Because his eyes were glued on the chewing-gum-covered carpet, he didn't see the triumphant smirk that Heracles was wearing.

"I hope you were taking notes, class, because I want an essay on Romeo and Juliet's love on my desk for Friday," the bell rung, as if on cue, "Off you go."

Just as Kiku was about to escape to the safety of the corridor, a strong arm held him back. He didn't need to turn around to know it was Heracles.

"I need a word," he said simply.

"Go on without me," Kiku told Feliciano, who nodded sheepishly, and followed Ludwig out of the door.

Once the classroom had emptied, Heracles sat down on top of a table, issuing for Kiku to do the same. Kiku didn't believe sitting on top of tables showed a lot of respect for the furniture, so he pulled out a chair, and sat on that. Heracles shrugged, and started his little 'talk'.

"I miss you, you know."

"I miss you too…" Kiku said, avoiding his gaze.

"Then why don't you come back to me?" Heracles asked, a little more emotion in his voice than usual.

Kiku shook his head, "You're a teacher and I'm a student – it could never work. Besides, I have a boyfriend."

Heracles' eyes widened a little at this, but he quickly shook it off, "But you promised – you said that we couldn't be together _for the time being_. You said that when you were ready, you could accept me! It's been over a year, surely that's long enough?"

"Heracles-san…" Kiku didn't bother to call his teacher by his last name, "I'm not _ready_ yet. And, as I said before – I have a boyfriend, who I'm meant to be meeting in," he checked his watch, "Five minutes!"

"I can't let you go. Not that easily." Heracles shook his head, "It's so hard without you, Kiku. No one even _beings_ to compare to you, you know that? You're _perfect."_

"Heracles-san, I'm flattered, but I really must be going," Kiku said, knowing that he'd hurt Heracles' feelings. He couldn't help it – he needed to tell the man straight.

Nodding, the teacher stood up, walking over to the door and held it open for Kiku, "Have a good day, then, Kiku."

Kiku knew that this wasn't going to be the end of this conversation. Heracles didn't just _give up_ like that. He'd probably hatch a sweet little plan. But, giving him the benefit of the doubt, Kiku nodded his head and flashed a quick smile at his English teacher and bolted for the open door.

_God that was intense…_ Kiku sighed. When he woke up this morning, he didn't think his day would've been filled with Shakespeare and kissing his ex.

Heading for the gate where he knew Lars would be waiting for him, he plastered a smile on his face. The school day was over! He should be happy – now he had the rest of his time to spend with sweet Lars. Someone who _wasn't_ sex-sessed.

_No_, Kiku's reckless side whispered, _he's drug-sessed._

Kiku wasn't thick – he knew Lars smoked many suspicious substances. He knew half of them could probably get him landed in prison for a long time. But, for some reason, rather than it putting Kiku off, it kind of made him want to stick around Lars even longer. He and Lars seemed to have a mutual sort of agreement that they'd never talk about his drugs. Kiku pretended not to know about Lars' addictions, and Lars pretended that he didn't know that Kiku knew about his habits. Kiku knew this could probably be quite a dangerous option for the two of them to take for many reason. That didn't stop him though.

The cold autumn air hit him hard as he skipped out of the back entrance that he'd gotten quite used to using ever since he'd started sneaking Lars into the school. Often they'd go out, but ever since the terrible English weather took a turn for the worst, they'd taken to sitting under Kiku's warm _kotatsu_. There was also the added benefit that Lars didn't like to smoke inside – and Kiku wanted to keep him away from the dangerous substances for as long as he could.

Rounding the final corner, Kiku smiled when he saw Lars' bright blonde head of hair waiting for him at the gate. Kiku ignored the cigarette (or that's what he hoped it was) that he quickly dropped to the ground upon seeing Kiku, and the Dutch boy waved at him, smiling.

"Hey there, Kiku," he smiled as the Japanese boy got closer, "I was wondering where you were."

"Sorry, a teacher needed a word with me…" Kiku muttered, trying not to think about Heracles.

Lars raised an eyebrow as he hopped over the gate gracefully, "Kiku Honda? Getting rebellious in your later school years? Don't worry – I know I did." Lars was a collage student, though Kiku knew full well that the only time he showed his face in collage was to see his 'friends' or to sleep in his apartment. If you were to ask him what collage was, he probably wouldn't even mention the classes.

Kiku smiled weakly, "No, it was just about…" Kiku blinked – what should he tell Lars? Thinking frantically, he blurted, "Culture."

"Culture?"

"Ehh… yeah. One of the teachers needed to know about Japanese culture…" Kiku made up hurriedly, and then quickly changed the subject, "It's really cold out here – why don't we go inside?"

"Good idea," Lars smiled roughly, "First though I want to steal something."

Kiku tensed up, blinking a few times, hoping he'd heard Lars wrong. Fair enough, he could do what he wanted in his spare time, but Kiku didn't want to be roped into it! "I-I'm sorry?"

Lars grinned, "Aww, you're so cute when you get worried. Chill, babes," Kiku didn't like that nickname, "I just want to steal a kiss."

"O-Oh…" Kiku sighed, relief flooding through him, "Well, I don't see why you have to _steal_ one – I'll give one away happily."

"You're took kind," Lars smirked, leaning down to Kiku, and pressing their lips together quickly. He pulled away, but paused at Kiku's ear, "I'll save the rest for when we're in the warm," he muttered. Kiku blushed, and couldn't deny the sudden feeling of desire that coursed through his veins.

"Let's go then," Kiku whispered back, and the two ran as quickly as they could towards the school.

* * *

"Will you two _stop kissing_ already? I'm trying to concentrate on my homework, for God's sake…"

"Arthur, this is _our_ room, surely _you_ should go and find some other place to work rather than bothering us!" Owain, who had his arms wrapped around Francis, glared at his brother.

"I'm doing something productive. The most you're going to do is catch AIDS from that frog," Arthur glared at his brother before turning back to his homework.

"I assure you, _mon cher_, if your brother was to catch a disease from me, he would've done so a very long time ago. I am completely clean… Well, that is unless you want me to be dirty," Francis winked at Owain, who grinned back at him.

"Give it a _rest_…" Arthur muttered tiredly.

"No! Go and bugger off if you can't put up with the lovey-dovey atmosphere!" Owain glared a his brother, not in the mood for being patient. It'd been his first chance in a while to have some alone time with Francis, and he didn't appreciate it being ruined by his brother.

"Fine, maybe I will! At least I'll get some peace somewhere else." Arthur grabbed his books and made for the door, "Have fun sucking each other's dicks!" he spat sarcastically.

"Oh, _mon cher_, we will," Francis drawled with a smirk, ignoring Arthur's sarcasm. Owain chuckled, even though Arthur had intended it as a joke, he really didn't understand the truth behind his accusation.

"Wait," Arthur caught on, "… You mean…?" you could hear the cogs working in his head, "Ugh! Why am even in the same _room_ as you two?" he darted for the door.

Francis grinned triumphantly, "Well that soon got rid of him!"

"Maybe I should reward you…" Owain muttered, kissing Francis hotly.

"Oh _mon cher, _you know you get me all hot when you dominate… It gets tiring always being in charge…" Francis said, happily letting Owain tackle him to the bed, his arms above him as the Welsh boy nipped his neck, leaving little bite marks where his teeth had lightly pinched the soft skin.

"Maybe I should take over then?" Owain smirked, but then added in a hurry, "But you still have to top me. I don't think I'd be too satisfying if I were the one doing the fucking…"

"Oh _mon cher,_ you know when you talk like that I could just _eat_ you…" Francis drawled, groaning a little, "I'm sure you'd be more than satisfying, but you're right – I don't like the idea of being on the bottom. Perhaps we'll try it in the future, but for now, I'll just let you do the teasing…"

"My pleasure…" Owain licked his lips a little, tangling their tongues together once again while his hands snaked down Francis' shirt sneakily, "I remember you being particularly sensitive over here… no?" he said lowly, moving over to Francis' ear, and blowing on it lightly, making the blonde shiver in anticipation.

"You are awfully good at this…" Francis commented, before shutting up as Owain sucked on the top of his ear seductively. Man that felt good.

"Well, I was taught by the very best…" Owain replied, "Too much talk, not enough sex, Francis."

"Of course, _mon cher_…" Francis smiled at Owain's new attitude, leaning back and closing his eyes, letting the pleasure take over him. Owain really _was_ experienced at this, even though he didn't usually get a lot of practice. If Francis' memory was correct, this was Owain's second time being the dominant one. Francis chuckled, oh this _would_ be fun.

Just as Owain had got to the good part – ripping Francis' school shirt off with his teeth and throwing his own perfectly-done-up tie to land on some random object of furniture – there was a painfully bad timed knock at the door. Owain growled a little – actually _growled_ – under his breath, glaring at the door before turning back to Francis.

"Leave them. They'll go away soon. It's probably Arthur begging for attention." Owain frantically began his licking/sucking/biting game with Francis' chest. Francis knew very well that he was going to get more than one hickey at the end of this heated session.

"My, my, you do get terribly aggressive when you're horny, dear Owain…" Francis muttered at the teen sitting on top of him, whose personality had been completely turned on it's head.

Ignoring him, Owain turned to glare at the door again, where the person was still knocking, "It frustrates me knowing that you'll never moan if you know someone could be listening… You're too proud to do such a thing… I want to make you moan. Why can't that person just _go away?"_

"You know me too well, _mon cher_," Francis chuckled, watching Owain climb off him, not even bothering to do up his shirt and open the door to their intruder.

Owain opened the door and glared at the person there, though he didn't explode like he originally intended to – he had a soft spot for Alastair, after all.

"Go away. I'm busy." Owain said shortly.

Alastair held up his hands in mock surrender, looking Owain up and down and raising his eyes at his open shirt and tight trousers, "I can see that… Bloody hell you're moody. I just thought you'd want to know—_"_

"Well I don't. Thank you for your concern – _good bye_." Owain turned curtly, trying to slam the door, but Alastair's sturdy foot stopped it. Owain didn't care though – he knew because Alastair was his brother, he'd clear off as quickly as Arthur did once he carried on with Francis. No brother wants to see their other brother getting off with another guy.

"So you don't want to know about Arthur and Alfred having a fight right in the middle of my dorm, then?"

"Not particularly…" Owain lied. Francis looked up with a grin on his face, curiosity burning.

"Or the fact that they're throwing things at each other?"

"Nope…"

"Or that some of the objects they're throwing are some of your wee dragon plushies you left behind when you moved into this room?"

Owain froze, and began buttoning up his shirt frantically. Before long, he was dragging Francis and Alastair out of the door with him, "_We have to save my dragons."_ He said slowly and as calmly as he could, running in the direction of Alastair's room, worried about his beloved plushies.

"It always gets him moving," Alastair grinned triumphantly, and glared at Francis who was doing up his tie.

"_Mon cher, _trust me, I didn't seduce Owain – he was the one that came on to me. I will never intentionally hurt him."

"That doesn't mean you won't _un_intentionally hurt him, Francis," Alastair glared, "Whether intentional or not, if Owain has a scratch on him, whether that be a physical scratch or an emotional scratch, I will find you, and destroy your pretty little face."

"I can assure you, _mon cher_, hurting Owain is the last thing that both of us want. I can't promise there won't be any scratches on him, though – sex does get a little rough with him, _especially_ when he's in a feisty mood like this…"

"Well you can expect a visit from me tomorrow morning," Alastair smiled sweetly, "Say goodbye to your nose."

"Okay, okay! We'll keep the biting to a minimum!"

"Good."

"_I don't know what's taking you two so long, but you need to come and save my dragons with me!"_ Owain shouted from up head.

"Drastic means, drastic measures…" Alastair muttered and then took off after his brother, Francis following after him.

Then Francis suddenly realised, "He left me for dragon plushies!"

* * *

Kiku had never felt more daring in his life before. Right now he felt like he was on top of the world – a very risky position to be in, but also enough to get your adrenaline pumping.

No, he didn't feel like he was on top of the world – he felt like the world was on top of _him_. His world, perching on him and kissing him like there was no tomorrow.

It was safe to say that Lars was _very_ experienced.

Part of Kiku wanted his to carry on. He liked the feeling of the Dutch's tongue dancing around his body in unpredictable ways, surprising him every time contact was made. He'd never gone this far with anyone – not even Heracles; he'd quickly stopped him when it looked like anything more than shirts were coming off. Right now, Kiku found himself with his shirt off, hands above his head, and trousers halfway down his legs, leaving his Pikachu boxers embarrassingly on show. He had the situation under control. He wouldn't let Lars go any further than this…

Well, he'd said that to himself when they'd sat down on the bed, then whenever his shirt was being taken off, and now look where it'd gotten him.

That was why the other part of Kiku was panicking. He knew he wasn't ready for sex in any way, but somehow it looked like a very possible outcome of this situation. He knew this would be a decision he would regret, but he didn't have the heart to stop Lars, and if he was truthful, he didn't want to stop Lars.

All he knew is that he was very, very confused.

Lars smiled down at him reassuringly, capturing their lips in another kiss. Kiku gasped a little when he felt Lars' hand fiddle with the hem of his boxers. That scared him. That scared him a lot.

Suddenly all of his feelings seemed to rush out at once, and he curled up into a tiny ball, tears flooding down his face. He felt childish – he didn't even _know_ why he'd burst into tears, he just felt so confused and downright terrified.

Obviously Lars wasn't expecting this rush of emotion either. He stepped back for a second, trying to figure out what he should do. He'd never been very good with situations like this. He'd always been with people that had told him crying was a sign of weakness, and that it was extremely feminine. But with Kiku it was different – it made _him_ want to cry too.

His instincts taking over, Lars reached for a blanket from Kiku's bed, wrapping it around the shaking teen.

"Shh, shh," Lars comforted, hugging Kiku the best he could, "Don't cry, Kiku. What's the matter?"

Kiku shook his head, "I-I don't know…"

"Did I go too far?" Lars asked quietly.

Kiku nodded sheepishly, "Y-yeah…"

"Don't worry, don't worry, I'm sorry, I'm really, _really_ sorry…" Lars didn't know why, but when comforting people it seemed you gain a weird habit of repeating things, "Kiku, I'm so sorry, I won't do it again, yeah? Is that good?"

"I-I'm sorry…"

"No, no! Don't be sorry, Kiku!" Lars panicked – what was he apologising for?

"I-I won't be able to give you what you want! It was like this with Heracles-san too… and then that ended in us breaking up… I'm sorry I'm not ready."

Heracles? "That English teacher?" ah yeah, Lars remembered Kiku telling him about a drop-dead-gorgeous Greek guy. "Listen, Kiku, whatever Heracles was like, I'm not like him. I'm not going to break up with you because you're not ready for sex! You can take _as long_ as you need."

"N-No, Heracles-san didn't break up with me, I broke up with _him_… he was willing to wait for me, just like you…" Kiku frowned mentally – why was he sticking up for Heracles?

"What? Why did you do that?" Lars asked kindly, though he let his confusion shine through.

"Because I hated not giving him what he wanted… the same with you," Kiku muttered through his tears.

Lars then understood. He wanted to hug Kiku and burst into tears himself, and just melt with Kiku's adorable modest side, "Kiku… Do you think that people only date you for the… physical benefits?"

"What?" Kiku looked up.

"Do you think that when people like Heracles and I date you, all we really care about is the sex?" Lars kept his tone quiet.

Kiku paused, "… You mean you don't?"

"Kiku, sex and all that shit is _secondary_. Some relationships are just for sex, but not us! And I'm sure it wasn't like that with Heracles. When we say we're willing to wait for you, we're not lying. We _mean_ it, because you mean an awful lot to us. Or you do to me – I can't speak on Heracles' part. Kiku, I'm with you now because I like being with you. You've made me a better person. Sex is just a benefit of our relationship – it brings pleasure to us bother, but that's _not_ why I'm with you. I couldn't care _less_ about that stuff if it meant loosing you. We can do it when you're ready, and not a moment before. I'm with you now because I really, _really_ like you, I like spending time with you, and I like talking to you. You've genuinely made me a better person. I might even love you, Kiku."

Kiku froze for a moment, and then his tears gushed out quicker, his sobs increasing.

"What? Did I say something wrong? Oh God are you okay?"

Kiku leaned in to Lars' hug, "I-I'm fine… I'm just… well, I'm really happy. I… I knew relationships _could_ be like how you said – where all people care about it holding hands and being with each other… but I just thought that people on TV got relationships like that… Especially with people older than me… I just thought you were all dating me because you liked the look of me… But, now I know it's not like that… It's a huge relief off my shoulders…" Kiku suddenly felt very bad about kissing Heracles in English earlier.

Lars smiled kindly, "Kiku, you're too modest. I just want to spend time with you – that's a blessing on it's own. Perhaps you caught my eye with your cute looks first, but I'm so glad I took time to get to know you."

"I'm glad you did too."

"Now let's get some clothes on you, and we can go out on a date, that sound good? It's only five o'clock. Maybe we can get food somewhere in town, yeah?"

"Yeah… Lars…?"

"Hmm?"

"Can you hold my hand?" Kiku whispered, blushing.

"You don't even have to ask, Kiku," Lars smiled, joining their hands.

Kiku smiled, shifting his blanked so it covered the two of them. He leant his head against Lars' strong shoulder, and squeezed his fingers, "Thank you."

**A/N**

**OOC. OOC. OOC. I KNOW. I'M SORRY. XD  
I've never written the Netherlands before XD I know he's _definitely not like that though_. X'D it was sort of a bad chapter to introduce him. But when I write him in the future, I'll make sure he's a little more like he really is. I guess he just has a soft spot for little Kiku?  
So… I hope that was all in the T-rated zone… *shifts gaze* I know it probably is, I just worry about these things XD  
And I'm sorry it took so long X'D I need to get my act together X'D  
Also, if you don't already, you should read Alastair's speech in his Scottish accent – I tried doing it today, and it made me roll about laughing X'D I've never done it before X'D  
Thanks again, guys! I love all you little reviews *glomps* and of course the faveouriters/followers *double glomp* you guys are awesome!**

**All my loves~**


	12. Goodbyes

**Chapter twelve – Goodbyes**

Arthur and Alfred were indeed throwing dragons at each other, to Owain's dismay.

"You're so _frustrating!_ I came here to apologise and you completely blank me!" Alfred shouted, lobbing a red ball of fluff, bouncing off Arthur head.

Arthur picked up a bigger dragon, tossing it at Alfred's torso, "I didn't realise that prats like you had 'apologise' in their vocabulary! You can't blame me for thinking you were picking a fight! You walked in here and started complaining about what a mess the place was! I'm pretty sure that's not an apology!"

"I was only saying it's not like you to live in a messy place!"

"Well I _learnt_ how to live in a messy place in our dorm – you never put anything away!" more fluffy dragons were fulfilling their dreams and soaring through the air.

"You sound like a middle aged woman!" Alfred shouted, glaring.

"Oh, there you go again with your feminine accusations! So much for your apology!" Arthur grabbed pillows this time, three hitting Alfred square on the nose.

Straightening his glasses and throwing the pillows right back, along with a few dragons for good measure, Alfred sighed impatiently, "You know what I mean! I wasn't actually accusing you of being a woman!"

"Well it bloody well sounded like it!"

"_Stop it, the pair of you!"_ Owain yelled at the top of his lungs, finally his trance of fear snapped, and he ran in between the pair of them, who were staring at him like he was a real life dragon.

Owain took his chance at their ceasefire, and went around swiping up all his beloved dragons. Soon, he had a large pile of the red and green plushies in his arms, and yanked the one Arthur had in his hand away, "Right. Thank you. Carry on – I'm off to fuck Francis."

With that, Owain ran back out the door, nothing more said.

Alfred and Arthur, both wondering if what they'd just witnessed had been real, turned to stare at each other, and for a moment or two, the pair had an urge to burst out laughing, like they would've done in the past. But both kept their expressions hard, waiting for the other to crack. Neither did, so the glares remained.

"You're impossible," Alfred shook his head tiredly as he picked up the pillows on the floor and threw them lazily on the bed.

He turned to leave, but walked right into the torso of Alastair, who did _not_ look happy.

"You know, I've only just realised…" Alastair muttered darkly, smiling dangerously at Alfred, "I never _did_ get to punch you, did I? But not only have you insulted my brother, you've also insulted my dorm. I think that gives me more than enough reason to punch you, don't you?"

Alfred blinked a few times, _damn it_, he remembered, _I'm still owed a punch of the twins too…_

Bracing himself, Alfred glared right back at Alastair, "Go on then. I guess it's only fair."

Alastair raised an eyebrow at Alfred's 'noble' attitude, but, shrugging, he wound up his right arm, looking extremely menacing. Alfred squeezed his eyes tightly shut, suddenly wishing he'd had the brains to remove his glasses.

But the punch never came.

He looked up, confused, to see an equally confused looking Alastair. Little did Alfred know, Alastair had caught Arthur eye just as his fist was about to come into satisfying contact with Alfred's nose. Much to Alastair's surprise, Arthur was shaking his head frantically, signalling for Alastair to stop.

As annoying as it was, Alastair obeyed his brother's wish. He also had the brains not to tell Alfred it was Arthur that had saved him – he didn't want to damage his brothers pride, so, in answer to Alfred's confused gaze, Alastair just glared back, muttering something about it being 'against his morals to hit little kids'.

Alfred didn't really care just as long as he wasn't getting a broken nose. Shrugging he took a final gaze – well, glare – at Arthur, and ran out into the corridor, frowning at Francis and Owain as he passed them back on his way to his dorm. They didn't see him – they were too busy with their tongues down each other's throats.

Back in his room, Arthur began clearing up some of the mess, "Sorry about that, Alastair."

"S'no problem, little brother," Alastair smiled, ruffling his hair fondly.

"You've been an awful lot nicer to me recently. What happened? Are you talking to Owain again?" Arthur grinned.

Alastair frowned half-seriously, "Hey, I'm in a good mood, so don't go putting me in a bad one again."

"But seriously, how're things with you two?"

"Fine, I guess."

"Alastair."

"We're _talking_, but I'll tell you the truth, it's not like we used to be…" Alastair paused, "I guess that's for the better though. Look, I'm going out. You can stay here with Gilbert tonight, if you want," (Gilbert had just moved into Alastair's dorm) "I'm sure you don't want to go near Owain and Francis when they're 'in the mood'." He scowled mockingly out of the door.

"Where're you going?"

"Stress relief. I won't be back tonight, probably. See you tomorrow, Artie," Alastair held up his hand in an almost-wave – a far too friendly notion for his brother, Arthur decided – and, slinging a messenger bag over his shoulder and lighting a cigarette, headed out the door.

_Well,_ Arthur thought, _I have no idea where Gilbert's got to, but apparently we're sharing a room tonight._

* * *

Gilbert was out trying to find Matthew.

Matthew, as Gilbert had heard from Antonio and Lovino, had gone in the direction of the outside grounds of the school. Fat load of help that was, though, as the school grounds had to be at least the size of ten football-pitches.

The search was on, then, Gilbert told himself.

Gilbert did have a pretty valid reason to want to go and see Matthew. Despite the fact that he was his _boyfriend_, and shouldn't really need an excuse to see his so called lover.

That was the very reason the albino was so very desperate to see Matthew. To discuss their practically non-existent relationship. Today would be the day that their relationship was either spectacularly revived by some sort of magical, love-spell, or, most likely the day where their relationship would be put out of its misery and quickly killed. Gilbert, naturally, was hoping for the amazing revision, but, like most good ideas, it probably was too good to expect.

So, his uniform pockets secretly stuffed with tissues, and his emotions as ready as he could make them for an inevitable break-up, Gilbert had decided to sought out the boy who'd been crushing his heart the past few weeks, and demand to know exactly _why_ Matthew had been so distant.

Of course, Gilbert knew exactly why – Alastair had told him. Matthew was flirting with Francis and kissing Owain. He knew that ages ago. But Gilbert wanted to see if Matthew would tell him or not, to see if Matthew trusted him.

And, Gilbert decided, _he_ would be the one to end it. He wouldn't come across as desperate and beg Matthew to stay with him. If Matthew _wanted_ to stay together and try and revive their relationship, then so be it. But if not, then Gilbert would be walking away single due to his own choices.

It didn't take him too long to find Matthew. The Canadian was under a large tree, one that Gilbert had seen him sitting under a lot recently.

"Hey," Gilbert called, making Matthew jump in shock.

"Jesus you scared me…" Matthew held a hand over his heart, "Hi."

Awkward silence.

"Eh… yes?" Matthew asked.

"How's life?" Gilbert asked, deciding not to jump into the deep end too early on. He sat down on the soft grass beside Matthew.

"S'good."

_Liar,_ Gilbert thought, _you're obviously upset about something_, "Good, good."

"You?"

"Same."

Silence again.

"You know, I shouldn't have to ask you that," Gilbert looked at Matthew, frowning, "I should know how you are. I should know what's new with you. I shouldn't have to wonder over awkwardly and ask you."

"What're you getting at?" Matthew said.

"You _know_ what I'm getting at," Gilbert kept his tone calm, "Me and you. We're meant to be dating. We're definitely not acting like it."

Matthew stayed quiet for a moment, and then said, "I know. I'm sorry… I've had a lot on my mind."

_Yeah, like other guys,_ Gilbert thought with a frown, "It's fine, but I do have a reason to be here… I want…" he took a deep breath, "I think we should stop dating."

"You're breaking up with me?" Matthew looked up at the albino, "Figures," he chuckled hollowly.

That annoyed Gilbert, "No, now don't go thinking you're the victim here! You can't drown yourself in self-pity and make me feel bad! _You_ made this happen! You _never_ see me. I've tried to meet up with you, take you on dates, but no! You always come up with pathetic excuses! Last week I asked you out on a date and you said you couldn't go because you had to clean out the fish tank! You don't even _have_ a fish tank! You're avoiding me, Matthew. _That's _why I'm ending it between us. Because you don't value me _at all_. You take me completely for granted, and I'm not having it. I still love you, Matthew, but I need to end this relationship for my own sake."

Matthew stared at Gilbert. Gilbert had never really anticipated this – he never thought Matthew would be looking up at him with big, glossy eyes, looking hurt beyond repair, "Gilbert… I never… I didn't mean to…!"

"Well you _did_. We're done."

Gilbert got up to leave, but stopped himself, remembering that he'd forgotten something, "One thing. _Why_ did you forget about me? Why did you avoid me?"

Matthew stayed silent.

Gilbert sighed internally_, I knew he wouldn't tell me_… "Thanks, Matthew. Have fun in life."

"Wait."

Gilbert turned, frowning, "What?"

"I avoided you… because…" Matthew hesitated, not meeting Gilbert's eyes, "Because…"

Was he really going to admit it to Gilbert?"

"Because I thought you didn't love me."

What a _load of bullshit_.

Laughing a little hysterically, Gilbert turned fully, "That is _not_ why you were avoiding me! Don't even_ try_ to play that card, you lying bitch!"

Matthew flinched a little, "What…?"

"I know _exactly_ why you were avoiding me, Matthew. I just didn't want to say it. I wanted _you_ to come to _me_. I've told you that I'd never get angry or annoyed at you if you came to tell me something that you'd done wrong. But I never said I wouldn't get angry at something you _didn't_ tell me. I wanted to see if you trusted me, like I trusted you. Apparently it was too much of me to assume that our feelings of trust were mutual."

"Gilbert I… I don't know what you're talking about!"

"Are you _still_ playing dumb? Matthew I _know_ you were flirting with Francis, and I _know_ you kissed Owain! And I heard a rumour going round that you and Alfred had it on, too, but I have no proof of that. You're a lying, backstabbing _slut_."

Maybe he'd gone a little too far.

Matthew stared at Gilbert completely speechless. Of everyone he knew, he'd never have expected Gilbert to say that to him. It seemed that both boys were as shocked as each other, as Gilbert stood there for a minute, seeming to be wondering if he should apologise. But, the albino did nothing, he just shook his head, and turned, walking away slowly.

Staring at him like it was a dream, Matthew found himself calling to Gilbert very softly.

"Gilbert, Gilbert, _wait_… Please… Please come back…!"

Gilbert either didn't hear him or just plain ignored him, and just carried on walking.

With a sigh, Matthew buried his face in his hands. He'd messed up. He'd made an enemy out of Owain, made Francis want to drown in his own guilt, and fucked up his relationship with Alfred. But worst of all, he'd ruined his relationship with Gilbert, shattering the boy's heart.

* * *

_Knock, knock, knock._

Alastair hated knocking. It felt like such a waste of time.

He stood outside the door he'd just knocked on, waiting for the owner of the room to show their face.

"Who is it at this time?" he heard one voice through the door.

"Dunno. Whoever it is, try soaking them with water to teach them a lesson!"

Alastair frowned. He didn't particularly want to be soaked. Maybe he should take a leaf from Owain's book and always carry an umbrella with him.

Luckily the door opened and no water was there to greet him. Alastair smirked at the opener – just the person he was looking for.

Elizabeth.

"Hello there, my dear, fancy a fuck? Stress is building up, and I really could do with a big of pleasure, if you know what I mean…" Alastair drawled, leaning against the doorframe. Maybe he should've brought a rose to stick in his teeth.

Oh God. He'd been around Francis too much.

"No, thanks."

Alastair stared down at her, eyes widening. It was a fundamental rule of the universe that Elizabeth never said _'no'_! She never _turned him down!_ What was this trickery? Who'd captured the real Elizabeth? Was she hurt? Maybe she was being probed by aliens. Alastair didn't really care what happened to Elizabeth herself, he was more bothered by the fact that he might not have a 'fuck-buddy' anymore, as Francis had taken to calling her.

"_What?_"

"I said no thanks," she frowned, "Bye."

Just as she was about to close the door, Alastair stuck his foot in between the gap, keeping it open, "_Why?"_

"I'm…" she hesitated, looking doubtful for the first time, "Busy."

"With what!? Nothing's more important than this!" Alastair was now coming close to shouting with frustration.

"With _me_…" a new voice drawled, and Alastair looked up to meet the hypnotic blue eyes of Francesca. Though her eyes weren't exactly what he was focused on…

More the fact that she was _entirely naked._

Trying to stop himself from blushing lamely at her level of exposure, Alastair replaced his discomfort with a huge grin, "Great! We can have a threesome!"

The girls narrowed their eyes at him, "Fuck _off_, Alastair. I'm done with you and your stupid one-night sessions! I'm _over_ you. We can't have sex again."

"What, _ever?_" Alastair said, sounding like a whining little puppy. Yeah, he didn't want to spend time with Elizabeth, but she _was_ an easy road to pleasure! He couldn't _not have_ Elizabeth, "Why!?"

"Because…" Elizabeth paused, blushing a little, "Because… Just _because!"_

Francesca smirked, walking over to Elizabeth and Alastair, stepping up behind Elizabeth, wrapping her arms around the English girl, hands resting on her chest and lower stomach, and lifted her left leg up a little, pressing into the back of Elizabeth.

"_Because_,_ mon cher_," Francesca drawled confidently, "She isn't… pleasured by the likes of you and your inferior gender."

Alastair paused, trying to translate what she said into simple English. Then it clicked, "Elizabeth? You're a lesbian?"

"Shh! Not so loud, freak!"

Alastair couldn't stop the immature blush spreading from his head to his toe, "Fuck, that's hot. Well… good on you for coming out, I guess."

"T-Thanks…" Elizabeth muttered, hastily shoving Francesca off her and demanding for the girl to go and put some clothes on. Grudgingly, the French girl retreated back into the room, saying she'd be waiting on the bed, leaving Alastair and Elizabeth in a bit of an awkward silence.

"It's gunna be weird… Knowing you're not available for a bit of stress relief…" Alastair frowned, realising for the first time that this meant he'd have to actually put some effort into charming girls to his bed. Well, he could always cross over to the other side, so to speak… Gilbert looked up for a little 'stress relief'.

"Well you hardly valued me. I loved you too much," Elizabeth frowned, "You might not believe me, but I really did love you. Or for a time I did. That's why I never said no to you. Even though nothing would come of it, I still got to be close to you for a night."

Alastair stood there for a moment. Then he did something he never thought he'd do. He didn't really know what'd come over him to do it.

Gently, he lifted up Elizabeth's hand, holding it like a gentleman from the 1800's might. He raised it up, lowering his lips to the soft skin, kissing it gently. Nothing special, just an honest, chaste kiss. Never once leaving her alarmed gaze, Alastair smiled, placing her hand back at her side, "Thank you."

Elizabeth shook her head, "Thank _you_ for finally thanking me."

A silence.

Alastair looked at her, smile growing, "Part as friends?" he held out his hand.

"Part as friends," Elizabeth matched his grin, grabbing his hand, squeezing it.

"Well…" Alastair broke their now slightly awkward near hand-holding moment, "I'll let you get back to your…" he hesitated, "… Girlfriend."

Elizabeth stuck her bottom lip out in thought, "I never really thought of it that way… Thank, Alastair. Good luck with wherever you're going or doing."

"You too."

"See you."

"Bye."

The door shut.

_Well, that was a waste of time_… Alastair thought to himself, though he couldn't deny that his stomach was feeling a little lighter than it had before – his feeling of lust replaced with a happy, bubbly feeling, that, if in a physical form would probably resemble candyfloss and little balls of purple fluff.

_Jesus, maybe I should just write off all girls and just declare myself a gay man…_ Alastair joked with himself. Who joked with _themselves?_

Just as he was leaving, a little something caught his eye. A door opening to his left.

Out of it stepped a girl Alastair seemed to remember being called Emily Jones, and alongside her a small, very cute Asian girl who Alastair had never seen before. Both looked quite distressed; Emily biting her lip and staring worriedly at her phone, while the Asian tried to comfort her.

"Ladies? Everything okay?" Alastair sauntered over. Yes, his horniness may have been replaced by gay fluffy, happy feelings, but hell, why give up when there are two cute, vulnerable-looking girls standing right in front of you?

"Kirkland. How'd you get in here? If anyone sees you, you're screwed," Emily frowned.

"Thank you for informing me, Jones," Alastair decided to copy her last-name basis. He didn't want to sound too desperate, "And who's your friend here?"

"Sakura Honda. I wouldn't get too close if I were you," Emily warned.

_Honda… sounds familiar_… Alastair commented mentally, before leaning down to grin at Sakura, "Don't worry, I won't bite…"

"That's not what I'm worried about, see—"

_Slap_.

"She does…" Emily finished, looking up to see Alastair a few feet away from where he was originally standing, looking shell-shocked, and a huge red mark now on his cheek. Sakura, who was standing calmly, staring at him like he were a deadly animal let her arm fall back to her side, smiling, satisfied.

"Sorry, she's been taught by her father to do that to suspicious-looking strangers that come sauntering up to her," Emily explained, holding back a giggle.

"'Suspicious looking'!? And I don't _saunter_," Alastair frowned, and then saw the way Emily looked at him, "Okay, so maybe I'm a bit suspicious. It's no need to slap me!"

"Oh just go away, will ya? There's serious stuff going on over here…" Emily muttered, Sakura nodding with her.

"Why? What's happening? Anything I can assist you with?" Alastair still wasn't quite sure his motivation for offering his aid.

"No, just fuck off home will you?"

"Oh come on! Just tell me!"

"Fine. Gilbert broke up with Matthew. He, that being Matthew, text me five minutes ago, asking me to call him. We were about to, but _someone_ got in the way." Emily frowned.

Alastair raised an eyebrow. Why hadn't he heard anything about this? Flirting with girls could wait – he wanted the low-down on Gilbert and Matthew, "Seriously? Man… So… you want to talk to him?"

"Yeah, something like that. I want to know what's been going on with him recently. He's been… different." Emily narrowed her eyes.

"You're right… Look, I'll get you into the school if you want?" Alastair offered.

"What? _You_ help _us?_ What will you gain?"

"I wouldn't mind getting to hear the conversation…" Alastair suggested.

Chewing on her lip, Emily nodded, "Fine. Lead the way."

Alastair grinned, "Right this way."

_Fuck_, he suddenly thought, _maybe I _am_ gay. I just turned down sex for gossip._

_ Jesus._

**A/N**

**Not much to say here guys, just thanks for your support, and reviews are love! :D thanks!**


	13. Early November

**Chapter thirteen – Early November**

November came a lot quicker than expected. Before anyone knew it, the shops in and around town were getting kitted out with their red, green and white colour schemes, sales were on, and Christmas was slowly inching its way around the corner. The temperature was dropping as the days went on, more and more people beginning to wear scarves and hats, replacing ice cream with apple pies and orange juice with tea, coffee or hot chocolate.

Despite the seasons taking a cheerful change, not a lot was happening inside Goverek school. Still Arthur and Alfred were arguing, still Matthew was flirting with Francis and swearing at Owain, even after what'd happened with Gilbert. There were rumours that Gilbert and Alastair had even started going out – the Twins could confirm that they'd walked in on Gilbert and Alastair getting it on more than a few times, but whenever anyone asked, they'd either deny everything, or claim that it was just a series of one-night-stands. Either explanation was possible. Kiku was finally feeling a little more comfortable with himself, and had managed to let Lars go a little further, though the emphasis was on the little.

The second week of November was when everything would change again.

The boys were currently on a 'study break' as their teachers had called it – all their controlled assessments from October were over, and now they were preparing for mock exams in January, though, luckily for them, they were being given a little time to themselves. Most boys were spending it with their 'special someone' – whether they be female or male, though usually the latter. Arthur and the other single boys just spent their time moping about and being unproductive, something that Miss Héderváry was heavily dissuading.

"Listen, I don't want to annoy you and start shouting 'YOLO' everywhere, but there _is_ some truth in it! You _do_ only live once, and you need to make the most of it. Yeah, you don't have to do stupid things like you see in _some _pictures that are hash-tagged YOLO, but really, you can't spend your younger years moping around computer screens and generally being a nuisance!"

The class stared at her silently.

Miss Héderváry gave them a look as if to say _'what?'_, but then, she seemed to suddenly catch on to the class' cynical looks, and slapped a hand over her mouth.

"Jesus Christ I sound like an old woman, don't I?"

The class nodded as one.

"Bloody _hell_. Right. Fuck this! No rules – do what you want – swear all the time!" she threw her hands up, and shook her head frantically, "Nope, nope, nope! I'm not getting old! I'm not going to become a senile old woman who can only complain! Nope, nope, nope!"

"Don't worry, Miss, you're too awesome to be senile!" Alfred called out with a grin. Recently, he'd been becoming more and more like his innocent, old self, something Arthur was secretly very thankful for. Just because he wasn't dating Alfred didn't mean he didn't care about him.

"Thank you Alfred… But speaking of getting older, I need to tell you all something," she cleared her throat, regaining the class' attention, "Today is my last day."

Bedlam broke out.

"_What!? You can't just _go!_ What're we going to do without you!?"_

"_Tell me you're joking!"_

_ "You can't leave!"_

_ "Why? What did we do wrong!?"_

_ "I'm sorry! I'm sorry for anything I've done! Please miss, you're the best teacher ever, just don't _leave!"

Every student had their own little monologue of regret and sorrow at Miss Héderváry's words. Alastair looked very tempted to throw a chair out of the open window.

"Woah, woah, _calm_ everyone! Sit, sit! And Alfred, please get _up_ off the floor. Let me explain," she said to her form class calmly, "This is why I'm going," she issued to her stomach.

No one really understood, until Arthur stood up, slapping his forehead in annoyance.

"You idiots! She's not _leaving_ – not forever! She's going on maternity leave, don't you remember her telling us?"

The class stared at Arthur, then at Miss Héderváry, then at her very large stomach.

"Oh yeah! I forgot she was pregnant!" someone called out.

"I kinda got used to the bulge!" called out another stupidly, earning a glare off Miss Héderváry.

"As I was saying," she laughed a little at her class, "Today is my last day here – _but I will be coming back,"_ she added in a rush, "So I want to make this one count. Remember, if you're ever feeling like you need a shoulder to cry on, then you can talk to Mr. Edelstein, or just give me a call. I'm your form tutor – I need to be there for you when things matter most, okay? And don't _laugh_, Alastair, boys do have feelings too, you're just rubbish at expressing them at times!"

The class nodded, muttering awkward agreements.

The bell then rung, and everyone sprung to their feet, making for the door.

"Now don't forget about what I said! You all have feelings too!"

"Yes, yes!" called a handful of boys, and soon the classroom was empty.

Sitting down and shaking her head, Miss Héderváry laughed to herself. _Boys,_ she thought, _they never will admit to their true feelings. Unless they're gay, _suddenly Arthur popped up in her head, _okay, so not all gay boys either._

Miss Héderváry smiled to herself, taking a sip of tea and patting her stomach.

"Not long now, _baba_," Miss Héderváry shook her head, "God I hope nothing goes wrong."

Before she could muse her thoughts aloud any longer, however, there was a knock at the door, and in a rush ran Gilbert, looking distraught.

"Miss! You should've told me today was your last day, I'd have got you a card!" he pouted, and then blushed a little, "N-Not that I was planning to or anything."

"Oh Gilbert, being bashful doesn't suit you!" Miss Héderváry grinned, getting up from her desk and holding her arms out for a hug, "I won't be gone long, yeah? There's no need for a card!"

Gilbert frowned, "But…" he furrowed his brow, trying to think of the words, "What will you do without my awesome presence in your life?"

"Oh just admit that you'll miss me!" she rolled her eyes, "I'm sure me and my sweet little baby will manage."

"But when you come back you'll be different! Everyone's different when they're a mum… They become responsible and boring! After today we'll never see Miss Héderváry – the woman who threw eggs at her boss – ever again! You'll be _Mrs. Edelstein! _You can't marry Edelstein!"

"Gilbert, Gilbert, Gilbert," Miss Héderváry laughed, putting a hand on his head, "This is _me_ you're talking to, do you really think I'm going to change? I'll always be quirky old me, mother and married status or no mother and married status. Now, you must've had a reason to flunk off first lesson other than to moan at me?"

Gilbert stared at the floor, "Well, yeah, but… You're obviously busy. I don't want to bother you."

Miss Héderváry rolled her eyes, "When have I ever been busy? Sit down and blab your heart out."

"But…"

Gilbert knew the look she was giving him. There was no escaping her wrath now. So, helplessly, he dragged a chair up to sit opposite her desk.

"It's Mattie."

"Ah. Him. Now, I've heard a lot, but I'm not exactly sure what was going on with that boy. I didn't want to ask him, in case he was feeling sensitive about it…" Miss Héderváry frowned, leaning her elbows on her desk, and resting her chin on her hands, "What's happened?"

"Well, about a month ago we broke up, and…"

"You broke up? Why didn't you tell me!? What happened?"

"Calm it with the questions, woman!" Gilbert grinned to show he was joking, "But basically… he kissed Francis."

"No!"

"And Owain."

"You're _kidding!"_

"And Alfred."

Miss Héderváry looked about ready to insult Matthew greatly, but controlled herself, as teacher's aren't meant to backstab their own students, "_Why!?"_

Gilbert shrugged helplessly, "Dunno. But it happened," Gilbert shook his head, "I just don't get his _motive_."

Miss Héderváry nodded her head from side to side, "… An… accident?"

"How the _hell_ could that happen by accident?"

"Good point," Miss Héderváry decided to drop the false 'I-love-all-my-students' act, "Maybe he just liked the feeling of being the centre of attention for once, y'know? He's always being ignored, but now he's _finally_ being noticed, though in a negative way. But noticed nonetheless. He probably wasn't happy with you, but just didn't realise it. The thought probably didn't even occur to him as you were always so nice to him. I think he's changed, yes, but the old Matthew is underneath this new him. Maybe you'll never get back together, but I think, once he changes, you can be friends."

Gilbert nodded slowly, "I see what you mean… But I still love him."

"It _will_ get better, you know," Miss Héderváry smiled, trying to catch Gilbert's gaze that'd fallen to the ground; she gently rested her hands on top of Gilberts, "Hey? C'mon Gil, give us an awesome grin."

Gilbert gave in and looked up, finally cracking with his usual grin, "Thanks miss. I don't really know why I came, I know everything you told me…"

"Sometimes you just need reassurance from another person, don't you?"

"Exactly."

"So what's going on with you and Alastair?" Miss Héderváry grinned mischievously, "I've heard the rumours."

"_God _that's un-awesome…" Gilbert's grin went from confident to embarrassed as he glued his eyes on the floor again, "There's really nothing serious going on. It really is just sex with no strings attached." He shrugged, "What can I say? We're just friends with benefits."

Rolling her eyes, Miss Héderváry shook her head, "That's terrible! I should be telling you to stop being such horny idiots! But I know no matter what I say it won't stop you."

Gilbert nodded. Of course it wouldn't.

"So how's your brother?" Miss Héderváry played with a strand of her hair, curling it around a finger, "I heard he was offered a place in a _pretty _impressive university…"

"Oxford, yeah…" Gilbert gritted his teeth, frowning, "Of course he's going to leave everyone behind and put his work first. I wish dad would talk to him about it."

Miss Héderváry frowned, "What, even Feli?"

"Yeah. Well, even if Feli went with him, Ludwig would pretty much ignore him – not deliberately, like, but just because he'd be weighed down with so much work," Gilbert shook his head, "We can't _stop_ him, but I wish we could."

"Well… you've gotta let him do what he has to do," Miss Héderváry sighed, "It is a shame though…"

"Yeah…" Gilbert sighed, and then clapped his hands, jumping to his feet, "But I don't want to get all down about it/ I have to stay awesome – it's your last day! I'm gunna run out and get a card for you and drop it off after school! Thanks, miss!"

With that, Gilbert was out the door, not letting Miss Héderváry lecture him on skiving lessons.

"That boy…" Miss Héderváry rolled her eyes, and lay back in her chair, patting her stomach reassuringly before going on to make some papers.

* * *

Francis was feeling guilty.

He was feeling so guilty; in fact, he was beginning to feel a little sick. And Francis was _never _ill in the slightest – he always took his vitamins in the morning, and went to ridiculous extents to keep his health in perfect condition. So this churning feeling in his stomach could only be due to his guilt.

Finally, he'd come to a conclusion he'd have to admit about his little flirting sessions with Matthew to Owain. He didn't _want_ to – he felt terrible about doing it. But he had to.

But what had spurred on this sudden act of honesty?

Actually it'd been in their usually very boring R.E. Lesson with scary Mr. Oxenstierna. They'd just come on to the topic of relationships, marriages and divorces. A very sensitive topic for most boys in the class.

"So cl'ss," Mr. Oxenstierna said in his heavily accented, ominous voice, "Why m'ght y'u get a divorce?"

Arthur's hand flew into the air.

"Arth'r?"

"Because your marriage just isn't working."

"G'd, g'd. Any more, any'ne?"

Hesitantly, Kiku raised his hand, "Perhaps because you both want different thing from the marriage?"

Mr. Oxenstierna nodded – he was actually a lot nice than he looked, "Y's, keep th'm coming."

Next Matthew raised his hand, "Because your interested in other people? Or just not commited?"

Mr. Oxenstierna nodded his head.

Owain's hand was next, "Maybe… You cheated on your partner? Or they cheated on you…?"

"Br'll'nt. Th't's all we need f'r now, th'nk y'u, every'ne," Mr. Oxenstierna turned to face the board, and began reading aloud instructions for the class.

That was exactly what had irked Francis' guilt. That, and the fact that when Owain was answering the question, he'd looked directly at Francis with an unreadable expression. Francis knew exactly what that gaze was for, of course. Owain must be suspicious – well, it _was_ quite obvious; it wasn't as if Matthew had made any attempts to hide their taboo flirting.

So Francis had convinced himself by the end of the day that he had to tell Owain.

The two of them were currently sitting in their dorm, Owain trying to do homework and Francis just lying on the bed, staring at the ceiling. Hosting himself up to his feet, Francis sat opposite Owain at the desk he was doing his homework on.

"Hey Francis," Owain smiled warmly, "Come to help me with my homework?"

"_Non_, sadly not, _mon cher_," Francis shook his head, "I… I need to tell you something."

Owain immediately saw that this was a pretty serious topic. He shut his book, and moved his whole body around to face Francis, "What's up?"

"Well… There is no easy way to say this," Francis took a deep breath, "I have cheated on you, _mon cher_. With Matthew. I'm not going to try to pin the blame on him; I admit, he did come on to me, but I could've easily said no and walked away. And I have done it more than once. I am very sorry – you have the right to do or say whatever you want to me."

Francis looked at the floor. The shout of anger, the cry of pain, the slap of frustration – none of them came. He met Owain's eyes, and saw _relief_ in them.

"I knew, Francis," Owain smiled a little, "I didn't know how far the two of you had gone – I thought it was just flirting between the pair of you. But that wasn't what was hurting me; it was that you hadn't come to tell me yourself. I thought you didn't trust me."

"Oh _mon cher_, no! I was so scared to lose you! It's not that I don't trust you… I really didn't know what to do… please, forgive me," Francis hung his head, placing a hand on Owain's shoulder, grateful that it wasn't shaken off.

"Francis, I never said I wouldn't forgive you," Owain smiled, tilting Francis' head up a little, "_Thank you._ I'm really not annoyed with you – I don't blame Matthew for flirting with you, and even though I wish you hadn't, I can understand why you responded to the flirting."

Francis wanted to melt with happiness! It'd been that _easy?_

"But…"

Oh.

"… I have something to tell you too," Owain took a deep breath, "Y-you're not the only one to kiss Matthew…"

Francis stayed silent for a moment, eyebrows knitted together, trying to make sense of Owain's words. Then it clicked. "What? _Mon cher_, you've kissed Matthew?" He wasn't angry, just confused to no end! They _hated_ one another!

"It wasn't romantic or anything," Owain hung his head, "Alastair says it was like a fight. Just to prove that we were better than one another, or something stupid. I swear nothing was meant by it!"

Francis shook his head, smiling, "Oh Owain, don't apologise – it is me that is at fault."

"Well, seeing as we're both at fault, why don't we just let them cancel each other out?" Owain smiled, "We're quits?"

"Completely equal," Francis nodded his head, "From now on, neither of us is to flirt with others, or have kissing competitions, _oui?_" Francis smiled, nuzzling his nose into Owain's neck.

"_Oui,_" Owain giggled, trying to escape the tickle of Francis' nose, "Thank you, Francis."

"We're equal, Owain – don't thank me, _mon cher_," Francis smiled, and gently leaned in for a kiss.

Owain responded perfectly, nipping at Francis' lips teasingly.

The tension that'd constantly been surrounding them the past few weeks had disappeared completely in only a few minutes, and God, the two of them were glad of it.

* * *

Heracles wasn't amused at Mr. Belischmidt.

That morning, he'd found a rather chunky envelope shoved through his apartment door which was just down from the school. He'd been pretty late that morning after a dangerously long over-sleeping-session, so hadn't had time to open it. But now, once he was home from stressful work, the content of the envelope was to be revealed!

Inside the brown paper lay more paper. Brilliant. Paperwork.

But it turns out Heracles was wrong, he found, whenever he opened the envelope, and found a rather thick document, with huge, emboldened and underlined capitals on the front reading 'TEACHERS' STANDARDS'.

Heracles frowned, looking for a note inside the envelope with an explanation. Sure enough, there was a very formal letter from the headmaster neatly folded up inside.

_'Dear Mr. Karpusi_

_ 'Enclosed with this letter is the Teacher's Code of Conduct for 2012. I want you to understand that all employees are expected to read, understand and follow these rules. Please also note, I didn't set these standards. The government control these documents and their content, so if you have any problems, I urge you to contact them as oppose to me._

_ 'Many thanks_

_ 'Mr. Belischmidt.'_

Brilliant. He'd have to learn all this? Heracles frowned, probably half of the teachers hadn't even bothered opening theirs. But then again, if he ever wanted to be a legendary mathematician, he'd have to follow the rules set by his boss, thought Heracles. So, making himself a mug of coffee, he sat down on his small sofa and began reading.

Most of it was just boring stuff about teaching the correct curriculum to students, and not to be disrespectful and blah, blah, blah.

It was the last page that had caught Heracles' eye, and Mr. Belischmidt's little highlight's he'd made, as if to draw Heracles' attention to a certain point.

'_PART TWO: PERSONAL AND PROFESSIONAL CONDUCT_' read the title.

Heracles sighed, reading the little introductory paragraph.

Then came the highlighted point that Mr. Belischmidt obviously wanted Heracles to pay attention to.

_'Teachers uphold public trust in the profession and maintain high standards of ethics and behaviour, within and outside school, by: treating pupils with dignity, building relationships rooted in mutual respect, __and at all times observing proper boundaries appropriate to a teacher's professional position.'_

Oh. _Now_ Heracles got the hint. This was Mr. Belischmidt telling him indirectly '_stay away from Kiku, or I'll fire you.'_

Sighing and skimming through the rest of the points, Heracles rolled his eyes, frowning. Of course his position as teacher would affect Kiku and him. There'd be no way they'd be allowed to date if he maintained his job as a teacher.

Just as he was half considering going to get a piece of paper to start writing a letter of resignation on, Heracles stood up and saw a little post it note flutter to the ground. He frowned, picking it up. It must've fallen off the document – no doubt another indirect hint from his boss.

He was wrong. Indeed, it was from Mr. Belischmidt, but on the fluorescently coloured piece of paper, lay a little informal note,

_'What I don't know won't hurt me._ – B'

Heracles stared at the note, then his face broke out into a grin. If this was what he thought it was, then this was his license to flirt with Kiku. As long as the headmaster didn't find out.

Without even thinking, Heracles ran out of his apartment, towards the school. He needed to talk to Kiku and convince him to get together with him again.

Come on, Heracles! He thought in self-encouragement, as he leapt over the gate gracefully.

Time to win back Kiku.

**A/N**

**I'm sorry for the gap you guys! ;A; I can't even use schoolwork as an excuse! I don't even know what happened! I hope you haven't given up on me! X'D  
But I think from now on I'm going to aim to get the chapters shorter, sorry DX that way, we can have (hopefully) quicker chapter updates, and then a bit of a smoother flow. Hopefully. X'D  
And I'm sorry for the lack of USUK! D: I swear it is coming soon! I has an idea!  
By the way, I wrote this chapter listening to 'She moves in her own was' by The Kooks~ I don't really know why – it's not even that a fitting song, but I think if you listen to it to, then it might give you the same sort of feel I got… Oh God idk, but it's a good song! So go Youtube it!  
I'm sorry for the OOC Character-ness D'X  
Lol so many apologies!  
Thanks for reviews, guys! I less than three you allllll!**


	14. Get this over with

**Chapter fourteen – Get this over with**

Arthur was very slowly pacing around, bored out of his mind. Today was the 5th November; Bonfire Night, one of the best nights in the world in his opinion. It was always freezing cold, so you'd have an excuse to wear a huge, fluffy scarf and drink warm drinks. Not only that, but you'd get to set off fireworks all night and eat chocolate brownies! Of course, school rules dictated that no pupil was to set off any fireworks. But the day Gilbert Belischmidt listened to a school rule would be the day the army replaced tanks with unicorns. So, there'd been an 'unofficial agreement' that anyone who wanted to celebrate with fireworks, food, and most likely alcohol, had better make it to the back of the school for eight pm.

But, Arthur had another six hours to kill before then. And recently his method of killing time hadn't been so successful.

A while back, when everything was okay and he was with Alfred every second of the day, Arthur's mind had been alert and awake – he could concentrate on a number of topics at once, keep himself easily amused, and quite easily have a laugh and a joke with his friends. But recently, for some reason or another, Arthur had just been completely out of it. He couldn't concentrate on his lessons, never really kept up with the conversations he was supposedly involved in with Owain, and _nothing_ seemed to make him feel content. Not even playing the piano amused him any more.

All he wanted to do, it seemed, was just _mope_. Not do anything. At first, he couldn't make sense of it – what on earth was desirable about doing _nothing?_

And then, one of the many times he was doing nothing but thinking, it clicked.

The reason for his constant subdued mood was that _stupid American_. After all, that's all he seemed to think about these days.

Arthur wasn't in denial. He was still in love with Alfred – he knew that. He didn't _want_ to be, but he was. Then, he'd asked himself the question – what was stopping him from marching up to Alfred and apologising?

The answer had been quite simple. First, he had nothing to apologise for. It was Alfred in the wrong, and therefore Alfred's responsibility to apologise. Of course, that wasn't _really_ what was stopping Arthur. That was an easily avoidable problem, really. The reason why he and Alfred weren't together right now was because Arthur was scared. He was scared of the possibility of Alfred saying that he no longer loved Arthur. Scared at risking knowing that he'd let Alfred slip through his grasp.

Cowardly, yes, but also the truth.

So Arthur, feeling all sentimental because of his new subdued mood, had decided to go to the last place he remembered pretty much the ultimate level of happy.

Padstow docks.

He knew just visiting that place wouldn't make him feel happy again. On the contrary, it'd probably bring a wave of melancholic nostalgia. But Arthur was stuck. He had two options – he could either move on and fall in love again, or he could go into reverse, and try and repair the damage he and Alfred had done, and fix their relationship. He couldn't stay in the meaningless limbo of nothing forever, after all.

That's why he was now standing ankle-deep in water. He'd removed his shoes and socks, just standing in the shallows of the icy water, getting weird glanced from sailors preparing their boats to sail. Arthur didn't blame them – if he saw someone randomly standing in water for no apparent reason, he'd give them a weird look.

But there was a _reason_ for his spontaneous paddling.

He was looking for something he'd never find. It'd take all the luck in the world, fate and countless other none-existent good luck charms for him to find what he really, really wished he could fine.

Perhaps, though, maybe if he crossed his fingers really, really tightly, then maybe… maybe would he find it?

The object that Arthur was looking for was something that he and Alfred had tossed into the ocean together at the beginning of September.

A bottle, and inside it two little notes – two very precious notes.

Back at the beginning of September, when Alfred had rescued him from the horrendous atmosphere of Starbucks with Owain and Francis, the American had taken them out on a boat, and they'd written their feelings for one another and sealed them inside a bottle they'd found, throwing them into the harbour. The harbour it's self was protected from the sea by a huge wall, keeping the rough ocean out. That usually meant items thrown into the harbour stayed there until they were fished out and disposed of.

That was Arthur's one little strand of hope – the one thing he could hold on to. Maybe, just maybe a fisherman hadn't found it yet. Maybe it'd got caught on a little rock pool somewhere. Maybe.

"Oi, you!"

Arthur groaned, turning to see an old, Irish fisherman. He knew that this guy was probably going to lecture him on standing in the middle of a busy dock and tell him to get out.

"You looking for this?"

Arthur felt his jaw dropping at the object the man held up.

The man was holding the bottle! Their note in the bottle! How? What? What? _What!?_

Arthur didn't care about the questions, he nodded hurriedly, and, with a shaking hand, accepted the bottle off the man, feeling it in his hands over and over to make sure it was real. It definitely felt real, and smelt it too. It practically radiated a salty, fishy smell.

"How did you know that this was mine?" Arthur blinked a few times, rolling down his trousers and putting his socks and shoes back on.

The man ignored the question, "You're Arthur Kirkland, aren't you?"

Arthur nodded.

"Alfred told me about you. He was the one who rented that boat off me back in September. He wouldn't stop rambling on about you, he wouldn't! Drove me insane! Going on about Arthur this and Arthur that. You could tell he was in love. Then, whenever I was clearing up the docks the day after, I found that wee bottle. I was about to throw it away, when Alfred came running up behind me, demanding I put down the bottle, that cheeky kid. Nevertheless, I gave him the bottle, and he explained that inside it were… how did he phrase it, again…? 'All the feelings of my wonderful relationship!' or something cute like that."

Arthur chuckled a little. How Alfred-esque.

"So he read the note, grinning like an idiot, and then gave me back the bottle, telling me to take care of it. I agreed, and so I kept the bottle. He came back again at the beginning of October, asking to see the note. Crying his eyes out, he was. He gave me back the note, asking me to take good care of it again." The man shrugged again, "And I guess that's why I gave it to you."

"But how did you know I was Arthur?"

"'Cause of his endless descriptions of you! He even showed me a picture of you! I figured seeing as you're both sentimental queers, you'd stop by here soon looking for this wee bottle, so there you go. Thank me, the poor fisherman roped into repairing a teenage romance."

Arthur wasn't too sure if he liked this man or not. Though, whenever he smiled roughly in his very fisherman-like way, Arthur suddenly decided he did like him.

"Thank you," Arthur nodded, "Without you… God, I don't know what would've happened."

"'S'no problem, mate. Enjoy the fireworks tonight!" He waved, before heading off to his boat, just like that.

Arthur stared at the note in disbelief. Alfred, that sly bastard, he thought fondly! The day after their date he'd snuck off to go and see what Arthur had written. Well, now it was Arthur's chance for revenge. He could see what Alfred had been thinking on that night, and remember the happy times.

Smiling sadly, Arthur sat up on the wall, pulling off the cork sealing away the pair of notes.

What surprised Arthur was the pair of notes were no longer a pair.

… They were a triplet.

Now, Arthur was pretty convinced that two notes couldn't make little baby notes, and paper doesn't just spontaneously reproduce, so what on earth was this third piece of paper, and where had it come from?

Only one way to find out.

Arthur opened all three notes, flattening them out on his lap gently. He saw his note and his ramblings about how much he loved Alfred. With a jolt he saw Alfred's note, but resisted reading it for the time being, and, finally saw the weird third note.

On it were two simple sentences, both in Alfred's untidy scrawl.

The first read, '_Aww Artie! That's so cute what you wrote! Love you too!"_ and beneath it, he'd dated it the day after their date. The second note was a lot shorter, a lot more painful to read, and a lot more powerful. Three little words and a date, that was all.

_'I miss this.'_

Dated…

One week ago.

Arthur wanted to cry. With happiness, with sadness, with confusion, with every emotion that anyone could feel. Alfred missed their relationship? What, was he just too cowardly just to come and apologise? Arthur shook his head, before he got too deep in thought about it, he wanted to read what Alfred had written about him.

Though, after reading it, and reading it again, Arthur had wished he'd waited until he'd gotten back to school to read it, because now, for one of the first times in his life, he was publicly crying. He wasn't too bothered about humiliation right now though.

"'_You know, before I met you, I really was lonely. Not in the sense I had no friends – I had loads of them. But I didn't have an _equal_; no one treated me like you did. You're different, and I'm glad you are. I know that when you tell me you love me, you're not making things up to please me. You really mean it, and it takes an awful lot of effort to say that, because you're so adorable and easily-embarrassed. Even the smallest compliment off you makes me smile, and though it doesn't look it, my heart races when you look at me, smile at me, touch me. God I could explode at any moment._

_ "'Don't let me loose you, Arthur. If I do something stupid, then make me stop. Make me see sense. Even if I'm acting all arrogant, remember, I'm still there somewhere, and that means that I'll always want you back if I was stupid enough to give you away. I love you'"_

Arthur read it aloud to himself over and over again, as if confirming the words were true. In comparison to his few words it made him look like an illiterate five-year-old. Alfred's grammar wasn't up to scratch, he'd made a few spelling mistakes here and there, but the general message was sent. And it was bloody romantic.

So, very quickly, Arthur scribbled a note in reply on the third note, underneath Alfred's commentaries.

'_I miss this too_'.

That was simple enough. He dated it November 5th, and slipped it back inside the bottle, and slipped the bottle inside his bag.

Now to find Alfred.

* * *

Luckily for Arthur, Alfred wasn't too hard to find. He was where he always was these days. Sulking in his room. Of course he didn't call it sulking – he claimed he was getting homework done, but Arthur knew that Alfred's sudden mass of detentions had a reason for coming his way.

Alfred frowned as he opened the door to Arthur's polite knock, "Wha'ddya want?"

Arthur curved a bushy eyebrow, "How pleasant. You coming to Gilbert's fireworks later?"

He shrugged, "If I feel like it."

"Jesus you're so organised."

"I hope there's a reason you're here other than to just piss me off."

"Actually there is," Arthur said, now taking a more serious approach to the situation. He reached inside his little messenger bag he'd slung quickly around his shoulders, and pulled out the bottle. Locking gazes with Alfred, he pressed it inside his hands, "Here."

Alfred was keeping a very convincing poker face, but Arthur knew that there must be _some_ reaction from him. He wasn't that heartless, "Where did you get this from?" Alfred said in the same, unemotional voice that matched his face.

"A fisherman gave it to me," Arthur answered, matching the flat voice.

"And have you opened it?"

"You'll have to wait and see. But I'm going to the fireworks at the back of the school tonight. If you want to talk to me about it, then come and find me there," Arthur very nearly slipped into old habits and smiled at Alfred, luckily he managed to control his muscles, so they only twitched slightly, "Bye."

"Bye…" Alfred knitted his eyebrows together, obviously confused at what on earth was going on.

The door closed slowly, and Arthur turned around to face it. Half of him wanted to stay there and eavesdrop to see if Alfred was going to let his guard down with a reaction.

One thing Arthur did know though was that Alfred would _have_ to turn up later. There's no way he wouldn't! He'd want an explanation for the notes inside the bottle, surely? If they _both_ missed their relationship, then he wouldn't… he _couldn't_ shy away from an opportunity to fix it.

After checking his watch, he decided he had about an hour to get ready.

Well, may as well try and be a bit gayer and care a little more about his appearance. He'd have to steal some shampoo off Francis, then.

* * *

Lars was pleased with himself. That was different for him, to be pleased with himself. Usually he was ashamed of himself, swearing at his stupidity, and then entering the old cycle of drinking and smoking. Well nope, that hadn't happened today. _That _was why he was so pleased with himself.

"I haven't had _anything_ for twenty four hours!" he practically shouted when Kiku opened his dormitory door, and Lars flung his arms around the structure of the small boy, uncharacteristically happy, "No drugs, no drink, _nothing_."

Kiku's eyes widened a little, and a smile spread across his face, "Lars-san, that's _brilliant!"_

"Nope. You said that if I went clean for twenty four hours, you'd leave the '-san' off my name." Lars frowned.

"Was that really your motivation…?" Kiku laughed a little nervously, "Okay, a deal is a deal. Lars, that's brilliant." A crimson blush blossomed on his face.

Lars smiled, his grin only growing bigger, "I swear, I'm in _such_ a good mood. I don't know, I just feel like a used to, absolutely ages ago… But better, because now I've got you."

Kiku nodded, "Yes, you do have me. And I have you."

"Listen, I'm sure you heard about Gilbert's unofficial firework show-thing going on at the back of the school in an hour? How 'bout you come with me? I won't drink a thing. Probably."

Kiku smiled, "I'd love to Lars, but you see I've got plans…"

"Oh? What're you doing?" Lars made sure to keep his tone perky, though his mood had sunk a little. He was really looking forward to a cliché, romantic night with Kiku.

"Ehh… well… ehh…" Kiku blinked nervously. Lars knew lying wasn't Kiku's strong point. He avoided it as much as possible, so there must be a good reason why he wasn't telling him where he was going.

"Don't worry, I shouldn't be so nosy, anyway," Lars smiled, trying not to let his good mood disappear, "But what time d'ya think you'll be done?"

Kiku smiled, glad for escaping the excuse, "I might be done around nine ish? I'm not sure, though, so I'll text you when we can meet, yeah? But don't come find me."

"Why?"

"I wouldn't want you to be standing around waiting for me when you could be with the others having fun…" Kiku tried -his lie more obvious than a huge pink elephant. Lars let it slide. He trusted Kiku – he must have a good reason for the lies.

"Well, I'll catch up with you later then, Kiku!" Lars smiled, waving as he walked.

As soon as he was gone, Kiku growled at himself with frustration. He felt _terrible_. He knew for weeks Lars had been trying his best to quit because he knew that Kiku felt uncomfortable about the whole drugs issue. Kiku was over the moon for Lars' clean twenty four hours. Maybe now he might actually have a chance of quitting. With a bit of rehab and new-found motivation from Kiku's little promises, then maybe he'd get out of the very deep hole he'd flung himself into.

But no. Just when Kiku could've joined him on a little celebration already had plans. Plans that he was feeling very guilty about. Plans that he never really wanted to make in the first place.

"Kiku, are you ready to go?"

Kiku frowned a little, feeling guilty at who was speaking to him, "You've got until half eight, okay? No more. I shouldn't be doing this for more than one reason, Heracles-san."

Heracles smiled, "You agreed one date with me."

"I know I did, but I shouldn't have," Kiku sighed. The other day, Heracles had pretty much demanded to take him out on a date this weekend. He wouldn't leave until Kiku said yes. At the time he thought 'oh what harm could it do?' after all, he could just reject Heracles after the date. The deal was that, after this one date, if it was Kiku's wish, Heracles had to leave him alone. In the long run, that was definitely a benefit for his and Lars' relationship. Then there'd be no awkward tension when Heracles happened to come up in a conversation.

"Don't be like that," Heracles smiled, "Please, just for tonight, be honest with yourself. Just come out with me, and let your heart rule your head, okay? Don't put a time limit on us just so you can see Lars. The only thing he's good for is giving you second-hand smoke."

"Don't be like that. He's trying to quite, Heracles-san, please, just if we're going to do this, I won't think about Lars if you don't talk about him."

"You dropped the '-san' on his name then?" Heracles raised an eyebrow, "I never thought anyone would get that privilege. He must be pretty special."

"He is which is why I regret giving into you. And I hope that if somehow he finds out about this then he forgives me. He's too good for me as it is."

"Never say that," Heracles frowned, "No one's too good for you, Kiku, _no one_."

"Please, let's just get this over with."

**A/N**

**Hey X'D remember me? X'D Jeeze I need to update more X'D  
Poor Heracles:'( poor Lars :'( poor Kiku :'( POOR EVERYONE! Is it bad that I'm starting to want Lars to win in that little triangle? X'D don't worry, it'll – probably – end up as GiriPan as the winning pair X'D  
I'll try and include a little more Spamano, Nordis, RoChu and other little popular pairings in the side a bit more X'D  
And Arthur and Alfred aren't made up just yet ;3 don't worry. Think happy endings~**

**Love you if you reviewed! Last chapter I got some utterly LOVELY reviews :') seriously, I was practically in tears! Thank you, you guys :')  
Love you!**


	15. A date with your English teacher

**Chapter fifteen – A date with your English teacher**

To be fair to Gilbert, he had a thing with fireworks. He'd always been the one to smuggle in the tame explosives into the school and managed to set them off in impressive, inventive ways without any expensive technology. What he did every year probably put his life in danger, what from leaping around in a minefield of lit fireworks, running off to set off the right one at the right time, but his sacrifice definitely was impressive. This year everyone was greatly looking forward to it – he'd even been given donations by some of the richer students, and even some of the teachers. He was being helped out Lovino and Antonio, too, so this was bound to be an impressive night.

Hopefully impressive in more ways than one, Arthur thought. Not only would he get amazing fireworks, hot chocolate, chocolate brownies and a great time with his brother and few friends, he'd also have an opportunity to make things up with Alfred. An opportunity that was making his stomach feel like every species of butterfly was fluttering around inside it.

Like he'd promised himself, he'd had a shower and Owain had managed to sneak him some expensive French soapy stuff. Clueless, Arthur had smothered himself in flowery smelling bubbles, and, to be fair to Francis' bathing products, Arthur didn't smell half bad when he came out of the shower. His skin was certainly a lot softer than usual, too.

Smiling inwardly as he walked towards the unmistakeable smell of a lit fire, Arthur sighed a little. Perhaps, now, everything would be over. He could take a big, deep breath and just relax, slip back into the old life with Alfred. He'd found that bottle against all odds, so maybe another miracle would happen tonight.

Arthur soon joined the thick of the crowd, everyone gathered around a huge bonfire, waiting for the first of the fireworks to go off. Telling himself he most definitely _wasn't_ frantically searching for Alfred, Arthur began pacing around, eyes darting everywhere, terrified and excited at the same time.

"Arthur! Hiya!"

Arthur looked up, excited, but then saw it was Owain running towards him. Arthur frowned, "Hi, Owain."

Owain narrowed his eyes, "What's wrong?"

"Thought you were Alfred…" Arthur muttered.

Owain didn't attempt to hide the grin spreading across his face, "Oh Arthur! I'm so glad you're attempting to mend things!" he said.

"Look, I don't know if anything's going to happen, so don't get your hopes up…" Arthur said, though he could already feel the shy smile pulling at his lips.

"N'aww, you really are too adorable, you know? Well, my best of luck to you both!" Owain said with a smile, "I'm off to find Francis. If you find him, can you tell him I was looking for him, please?"

"Sure," Arthur nodded, "Have fun."

Owain disappeared off into the crowd of students, escaping Arthur's gaze extremely quickly. Just as Arthur settled himself down on a little rock that gave him what he thought a sufficient view of the whole crowd, the first firework, a bright red one, went off. It was followed by a bright white and golden one, and then, practically simultaneously, a deep blue one flew off into the sky. This was Gilbert's trademark beginning to a firework display. He always did the red white and blue – everyone had their own theories, but the most popular one was he liked those colours because his eyes were red, his hair was white, and his favourite colour was deep blue. Self-centred as always.

Arthur smiled as he looked up at the exploding patterns in the sky. The loud bangs drowned out any noise around him, and for a while he actually forgot about Alfred, and just let himself watch the fireworks.

"Hot chocolate?"

Arthur looked up, and found Matthew offering him a mug. Arthur frowned in confusion, but took the mug happily, shifting over on his rock to give Matthew some space to sit down. The Canadian smiled in thanks, gladly taking the seat.

"The fireworks are pretty, don't you think?" Matthew said quietly.

Still a little confused, Arthur decided to go along with the direction of the conversation, "I guess so…"

"Hmm… Gives you time to think."

"Yeah…" Arthur agreed doubtfully, eyeing Matthew, "Is everything okay?"

Matthew shrugged, "I guess so. I've finally realised I'm as twisted as everyone says I am…"

Arthur sighed. He really didn't want a conversation like this now, but apparently he had to have it, "Why do you say that?"

"Because…" Matthew sighed, "Sorry, you really don't want to hear this, do you?"

"No, no, it's fine! Go ahead!" Arthur lied blatantly.

Matthew smiled, and just as he was about to cry his heart out, Alfred came to the rescue.

"Kirkland. You wanted a word?" Alfred said, casually walking up to the rock.

Arthur narrowed his eyes at the use of the last name, "Yes I did. I assume you read the notes in that bottle."

Alfred avoided Arthur's gaze, "I did."

"Good," Arthur said, climbing to his feet, and then turned to Matthew, "Sorry, Matthew, but I'll have to talk to you later… I have things to do."

Matthew smiled, "It's no problem, bye."

Arthur waved, and then turned to Alfred, "Let's get out of all this noise."

Alfred nodded, and the two of them walked in silence to a much quieter place. They wordlessly chose to sit on a wall that separated the school it's self from the outer grounds. Luckily they still had a clear view of Gilbert's utterly beautiful fireworks, but were spared from the deafeningly loud bangs.

"So you miss me then?" Alfred began.

Arthur frowned, "Don't make me sound so desperate – you're the one who said you missed me first."

Alfred weighed his head from side to side, "Fair enough."

"Now what, then?"

"Well I don' know."

They sat in silence.

"This is ridiculous – we both want to be with each other right now – we've both done stupid things – so what the hell is stopping us from leaping into each other's arms and returning to each other like a fairy-tale couple?" Arthur said, utterly exasperated and tired out from how hard social convention was.

"This isn't a fairy-tale?" Alfred shrugged, "I don't know, but something doesn't feel right."

Arthur nodded. They didn't know what it _was_, like.

Then it hit Arthur, "Well you haven't apologised for all those things you said."

"What things?" Alfred narrowed his eyes.

"You know – calling me a girl, a pushover, and telling me I was insecure. I also heard that something happened between you and Matthew a while back, too."

Alfred glared at the floor. How had Arthur found out about that? "Look, I'm sorry about that, but are you really still bothered about that _now?_ It's November for God's sake!"

"Yes, I know the month! And the fact that I'm still _bothered_ about it shows how much it bothered me! I know I'm insecure, and can be a bit of a pushover, and have _some_ girly ideas about love – but I was slowly trying to fix that about myself! I didn't really like it when you just walked over and shouted all my bad qualities down my ear!" Arthur shouted, frustrated beyond belief.

"Well did it ever occur to you that maybe _you_ were over-reacting?" Alfred shot back.

"Maybe I did a bit, but that still doesn't excuse what you said to me!" Arthur glared.

Alfred simply pouted childishly, turning his gaze away and mumbled something inaudible.

"What?" Arthur said.

Alfred sighed, repeating his mumble a little louder, "You said bitchy things to me when we were dating. I'm not the only one."

Arthur frowned, "What?" He genuinely didn't know what Alfred was talking about, "Okay, give me one example when I've said something terrible like that to you."

Shrugging, Alfred began, "Take your pick. It was at least once a day you'd call me 'idiot', or shove me off you when I go to kiss you – constantly swear at me – hit me. It's an endless list, Arthur."

Arthur winced. That was _below_ the belt. "Alfred! You know full well that I act that way because I'm just _like_ that! It's like Lovino and Antonio! It's even worse for them! Surely you know I'm not serious!"

"I know you're not serious, but it's not particularly fun, either!" Alfred said, his voice gaining volume.

"So what, you want me to change who I am for you!?" Arthur demanded.

"That might be nice, yes! And while you're changing your personality, why not try plucking your eyebrows, too?" Alfred growled, putting his fingers over his own eyebrows and wiggling them like little caterpillars, imitating what Arthur's eyebrows looked like.

"That was just _cruel_, Alfred! You didn't have to say that!" Arthur buried his face in his hands, suddenly feeling very self conscious of his eyebrows. He knew his face was beet red.

Alfred ignored him. He didn't apologise, but he didn't continue with his eyebrow impressions. The silence was a long and very, very awkward one.

"Well now what? Do we kiss and make up, or do we carry on fighting like seven year olds?" Arthur mumbled into his hands. He was making the latter seem very possible.

"How the hell am I meant to know?" Alfred spat on the floor.

Sighing, Arthur climbed to his feet, not offering Alfred a hand up, "Well I'm not wasting my evening with someone who refuses to apologise. See you around, Alfred."

Arthur's cool strut away was interrupted by Alfred catching his arm, "Arthur wait."

Arthur turned, his heart in his mouth – could this be what he was hoping for?

It turned out it wasn't what he was hoping for. It was something good, but not an apology.

It was a kiss. Alfred had very innocently pressed their lips together in a chaste embrace, something that Arthur had missed a lot about their relationship.

Alfred was about to pull back, when suddenly Arthur flung his arms around Alfred, crushing their lips together once more, this time their tongues going a little further, and the innocent approach slowly getting replaced by a mature, hot make-put session.

Arthur felt Alfred's cool fingers fly about his lower torso, never once staying in the same place for more than a few seconds – he was obviously unsure whether or not he was allowed to do this. Smiling a little to himself, Arthur unhooked a hand from Alfred's hair, and held the American's hand on his own lower back, giving the clear message of '_yes, you can do this._'

And that is exactly what Alfred did. Arthur felt a little gasp escape his mouth as Alfred's hands travelled south, slipping inside the tight waist of his skinny jeans, and then through the elasticised layer of his boxer shorts, his cold flesh now touching the very top of Arthur's ass.

This was something new. Something they'd never done before. Part of Arthur was screaming at them to stop, for common sense issues, and the fact that it didn't feel quite right that they were doing this _now_, even when they were supposedly in the middle of a fight.

Stupidity won though, and Arthur pretended not to bat an eye at Alfred's new level. In fact, Arthur's stupid side said to himself, he could match Alfred's level.

So, stupidly, like his stupid-self demanded, Arthur reached around to the front of Alfred's jeans, unbuttoning them, and fiddling with the beginnings of Alfred's American flag boxers. Arthur moaned a little as he felt Alfred shove his hand a little deeper down his own jeans, the temperature of his hand slowly contaminating his warmth.

"I knew we'd be back together," Arthur muttered happily.

"So we're back together?" Alfred whispered into Arthur's ear.

"Of course. That is, if you're willing to apologise."

Arthur knew from the moment it left his lips he'd made a mistake saying that.

His suspicions were confirmed when he slowly felt Alfred pull away, his hand sliding out from Arthur's jeans, and going to button up his own.

"Still so hung up over that then?" Alfred glared at Arthur, looking scarily disgusted.

"Yeah, I am!" Arthur was willing himself to shut up, though it seemed the little power he'd given to his stupid-self before had gone to it's head, and had now decided to control all actions permanently, "It's not much to say 'I'm sorry'!"

"And you could just _let it go!_ I let stuff you do go!"

"Oh yeah, like what!?"

"I told you before! The hitting, the insults, the coldness!"

Arthur growled aloud, "This is just a repeat of our argument before, idiot!"

"There you go again! Calling me names!"

"Oh just shut up, will you! So you're not willing to apologise?"

Alfred frowned, "No, not until you're ready to admit that you've been a bitch to me in the past, and that I'm right about you being insecure and girly!"

"Well that isn't happening any time soon, Jones!" Arthur felt both triumphant and cruel at the use of Alfred's surname.

"Fine with me, Kirkland!" Alfred matched.

"Fine!"

"Fine!"

They turned their backs on one another, not a single word said and just walked in the direction of their destination. Arthur didn't cry, he didn't even feel like tears were threatening his eyes. But in a way, it was worse because he didn't cry – he felt disappointed in himself, like he'd let everyone, including himself, down. Disgusted, he slammed his dormitory door shut, crawling into his bed, just lying there with his window open, listening to the crackles of the fireworks and the screeches of delight from his classmates. If only he were having as good a time as them.

* * *

"Why did you take me to a sushi restaurant?" Kiku muttered, and then quickly added, "But I'm very grateful."

"Oh, I know you are," Heracles said, his smile growing, "I took you here because I heard you talking to Feliciano about how much you missed your home cuisine."

"But we drove for half an hour to get here!"

"It would've taken us an hour and a half if I'd stuck to the speed limits like you told me to," Heracles said simply. Kiku knew he was very pleased that he had chance to show off his new sports car, though.

"Fine, fine," Kiku muttered, trying to shove images of Lars out of his mind. Instead he looked around the restaurant he was sitting in. To be fair, it was quite a nice place. There was dim, low lights hanging from all over the ceiling, and little spotlights built into every table. The tables themselves were some kind of black wood, and weren't really tables, more single bars. The walls were covered with very stereotypical Japanese things – like fans - with _Chinese_ text, Kiku noticed with annoyance – or copies of traditional Japanese pictures. However there was one wall that Kiku found himself studying, as it was pasted in old Japanese newspapers, and over the top of it here and there, someone had ripped out pages of manga, pinning them over the black and white text, mixing in nicely.

"Stop studying the décor and look at me," Heracles frowned, "You need to keep your side of the bargain."

Kiku sighed, "You're right, I'm very sorry Heracles-san," he said stiffly.

"Good," Heracles gave a satisfied smile, "What're you ordering?"

Kiku went with his old favourite of plain and simple ramen. Just ramen and nothing else. It would be very nostalgic.

"You sure you don't want anything else?" Heracles raised an eyebrow, "Don't worry about the price – I can pay. It's no problem," though secretly, Heracles was very pleased with Kiku's cheap meal choice, as after he'd blown an awful lot of money on a car he couldn't really afford, the figures on his bank statement looked a little too red and bold for his liking.

"That will suffice, Heracles-san, thank you." Kiku answered.

"Suit yourself," Heracles shrugged, acting indifferent and reciting their order to a cute looking Japanese waitress wearing cat ears, who smiled and greeted Kiku in their native language as she passed.

Heracles didn't look amused.

"I only said hello…" Kiku looked at the floor.

There was silence for a moment.

"You've really changed…" Heracles mused.

Kiku nearly spat out the water he was drinking, "You can speak for yourself."

"See, you never used to say things like that. Or you would've, and then you would've slapped a hand over your mouth, blushed, and apologised."

Heracles looked too happy at Kiku's shocked expression. Kiku avoided Heracles' gaze – the Greek did know him very well.

"I'm sorry," Heracles muttered under his breath.

"For what?" Kiku looked up, confused.

"For just being like this these past few weeks. And don't say 'like what' – you know what I mean," Heracles said, shaking his head, "I've been way too pushy with you. I haven't been nice, sweet or kind at all. It's no wonder you've been avoiding me like the plague."

"I wasn't avoiding you… I…" Kiku's excuse faded off into nothing. Both knew he was lying.

"I don't blame you. So… Kiku?"

"Yes?" Kiku now felt a familiar fluttering in his stomach.

Heracles sounded the shyest he had all night, "Will you, perhaps… give me a second chance? I won't act like I have the right to be with you – to kiss you whenever I feel like it. I'll act like I'm just a bystander in love with you, and that I have to make _you_ love _me_."

Kiku felt a faint blush spread across his cheeks, "But what about Lars? And you're a teacher! It could never work Heracles-san, no matter how much either of us want it to…"

Heracles smiled, digging into his pocket and bringing out a note, "I've got the teacher one covered," he slid the note over to Kiku. The Japanese boy read it inquisitively.

"_'What I don't know won't hurt me._ – B' What? What does this mean? Whose it from?" Kiku was completely clueless.

"It means I have permission to at least try and date you, as long as the head doesn't find out. That," Heracles nodded at the note, "Was enclosed with the teacher's code of conduct, which included all the rules about how teachers should act towards their students."

Kiku weighed his head from side to side, "Fair enough, but… what about Lars?"

"Break up with him," Heracles shrugged.

"I can't do that! I like him like I used to like you! I might even…" Kiku let the sentence trail off.

"Might even what?" Heracles narrowed his eyes.

"… _Love _him…" Kiku hung his head, face beet red.

There was an awkward silence as the waitress came over, placing their food in front of them, quickly bowing her head and making her way to another table, sensing the very awkward atmosphere.

Kiku and Heracles ate in silence for a while, neither catching the other's eye contact.

"Did you love me?" Heracles asked quietly about halfway through the meal.

Kiku didn't need to think before answering, "Yes, yes I did."

"Past tense?"

Kiku didn't answer. He didn't even know the answer himself. Heracles seemed to understand and dropped the topic swiftly.

"So how're your subjects going? Did I tell you I managed to get your mark for that assignment you had two weeks ago? You weren't meant to get it before it was officially released. I'm quite impressed with myself, you know," Heracles smiled "You got an A."

Kiku smiled, looking to the floor.

"You're disappointed with an A?" Heracles furrowed his eyebrows.

"Well I was hoping for an A*… English is one of my preferred subjects, after all…"Kiku said truthfully, taking a small mouthful of ramen.

"But Kiku – English is your second language! It's amazing you were even put in for the exam! It really is impressive," Heracles said encouragingly, "Really – I think I remember having a conversation with your mother once; she told me that you only started learning English a few months before you got here – which means you've only been speaking the language for four years. To be fluent in English and able to analyse it, take it apart, and write about it, then that's pretty amazing."

"No, it's not," Kiku shook his head, "Not now with the internet. _Everyone_, or it feels like everyone can speak English. English is your second language too!"

"Yeah, but I've been speaking it since I was a little kid. It feels like Greek is my second language, now," Heracles said, "That's kind of depressing I guess."

"I know what you mean… I even _think_ in English now. I only use Japanese at home, and even then we've started to talk more and more English. My mother wants to practice hers, you see. She's never been that good at it," Kiku sighed.

"I like this," Heracles said suddenly, "Conversations like this. About absolutely nothing. We can just talk about whatever we want… It's not awkward or scary… I don't feel under any pressure. Tell me you haven't missed this?"

Kiku had to admit he was enjoying himself now. It wasn't like when he was with Lars – with Lars he always on-edge, like he constantly had to make a good impression for his slightly intimidating boyfriend. Now with Heracles, it just felt _nice_. As he said, there was no pressure on them. It almost felt like he was with a good friend, only better. "I have to agree with you, if I'm honest."

Heracles smiled, and looked like he was about to say something, until he looked down at his watch and saw the time, "Shit…" he muttered under his breath, "What time did you say you needed to be back with Lars?"

"Half eight," though in truth Kiku wanted to stay right where he was.

"Right, well you know how we drove double the speed limit on our way here?"

"Yes?"

"We're going to have to drive triple it to get you back on time."

Kiku blinked a little nervously. He'd never been a fan of fast driving, "Please, just stick to the speed limit," he said, partly for his stomach, but mostly so he could spend more time with Heracles.

"But then we'll be back at about ten o'clock!"

"Please, just drive slowly."

"But Kiku…" Heracles then caught on, "Oh!" he smiled knowingly, "Of course."

Kiku didn't want to admit out loud that he wanted to be with Heracles, so was very grateful for the teacher's instant understanding.

The journey home was an awful lot better than the journey there, Kiku decided. He and Heracles had conversations about nothing that mattered – just things that stuck in their mind. For a while, Kiku even started softly singing along to the radio that was playing quietly, resulting in a shouting karaoke-session between the two.

At five to ten, Heracles pulled into the school car park, cutting the engine of the car.

"Well… Looks like we're done here, then…" Heracles sighed, "I had fun."

"Me too," Kiku smiled, "Thank you, Heracles."

"If you want to do it again another time, just speak to me. You know where I am," the Greek smiled, opening his door, and then coming around to Kiku's side, and like some sort of chauffeur, opened the door, and held a hand out for Kiku to take. Gingerly, Kiku placed his hand in Heracles', and found he was being gently pulled up into his teacher's arms in a simple, honest hug.

"I missed you so much," Heracles muttered into Kiku's hair, tickling his ear.

"I missed you too," Kiku whispered into his strong chest.

Heracles smiled to himself, and with a soft pat on top of Kiku's head, he stepped away, letting Kiku free, "I'll let you get back to Lars."

Kiku nodded, smiling, "Thank you, Heracles-san."

Heracles just shook his head, hugging Kiku briefly again, pressing his lips to Kiku's pale forehead. Without another word and a simple wave goodbye, he was gone.

Kiku held his hands up to his head, his heart pounding so hard it felt like the organ might go into overload and just _stop_. His breathing was faster than usual he noticed, and just couldn't get thoughts of Heracles out of his mind.

And then Lars took his place.

Kiku sighed, rubbing his forehead. He'd had such a wonderful evening, apart from the constant nagging feeling that was eating at him the entire date. It was all forbidden. Every single action that he and Heracles made was like a deep gash into Lars, and if he were to ever find out, not only would Kiku feel devastated about hurting Lars so much, but he'd probably gain a very dangerous enemy.

Shaking his head, Kiku just decided to brush it all off. He sent a simple text to Lars apologising for not getting back in time for the fireworks, and that he'd make up for it tomorrow and they'd go somewhere special. With that, he headed off in the direction of his dormitory, trying to shut up his thoughts.

Kiku was so very wrapped up in his own mental frustration; he didn't see the very boy he was thinking about lurking in a corner. Lars had seen it all – the flirting inside the car, the hug, the chaste kiss on the forehead. Just as Kiku had predicted, Lars felt numb all over, his insides all messed up with feelings of anger and betrayal. He just felt tired – weary of everything now. He just wanted to close his eyes and shake his head until it was okay.

Luckily Lars had been in this situation more than once. He knew a solution.

He grabbed a lighter out of his pocket, and soon, familiar smelling clouds of smoke surrounded him. He inhaled deeply, closing his eyes and letting the unique feeling take over him.

A little part of him wanted to curl up and start crying. He'd just broken his clean record. After all the trying he'd put in, he just ruined it like that. You could take so long to make something pure and beautiful, but only a few seconds to completely destroy it. Kiku had shown him that.

**A/N**

**Ugh X'D hello guys :) sorry for the wait again -.-  
And for those of you who actually thought Alfred and Arthur were going to get together, by now you should know me a little better X'D  
But the angst (I hope it's angst! X'D) will continue for quite a few more chapters X'D there's been quite a bit of angst these past few weeks for me, and I can draw inspiration from that X'D long story short, I like my best friend's ex boyfriend, who she still likes X'D of course, there's a lot more to it than that. But if things start getting happier in the story, then that means things are getting on good with me and him :P  
Don't ask me why I told you that X'D You're my online psychiatrists? Okay ignore me X'D  
London MCM at the weekend :'D  
BYE GUYS! THANK YOU FOR YOUR LOVELY REVIEWS! YOU MAKE ME VERY HAPPY!  
Love yas~**


	16. Ludwig and Feliciano

**Chapter sixteen – Ludwig and Feliciano**

"So this year we've decided that London will be the destination of our annual school trip."

Mr. Belischmidt was holding one of his famously boring assemblies, though, rather than the students groaning when they entered the hall like usual, they were all a little jumpy and excited. Why? Because today was the students found out where they'd be staying with their friends for a week. And, at the mention of London, half the students who'd been hoping for somewhere abroad sighed heavily, while the other half, who'd been hoping for that very city, jumped up off their seats, whooping with excitement.

"Okay, okay, settle down," Mr. Belischmidt called over the noise, "I know it wasn't as good as Madrid last year, but really, London is a very inspirational city. Mr. Køhler was convinced you'd all prefer Copenhagen, but the staff all had a vote on it, and London won. For information on prices, please stay behind at the end of assembly to collect letters which will later be sent home to your parents. Any questions?"

Gilbert stuck up his hand, "Will it be educational?"

Mr. Belischmidt frowned at his son, "Yes."

There was a groan throughout the entire body of boys.

"Partly," the head corrected himself, not liking being the bad-guy in the room. People straightened up a little at this, "As you know, we'll be following the tradition of previous years by staying for a week. For the first and last day, you will be in my company, and we will be going from King's Cross train station straight to the Science Museum, and a number of art galleries. However, the five days in between, you will be free to do as you wish."

There was a huge, in-synch gasp at this from all the boys. This was new. They were hardly ever able to go off independently.

"Year Sevens, Eights and Nines will go around with a member of staff, however Year Tens and Elevens, you will be trusted to be sensible and be allowed to go around on your own, providing you're in groups at all times. Breakfast at the hotel will be served every morning at eight, and curfew will be at eleven pm. The trip it's self will be a week before we break up for Christmas, so about six weeks away. That's everything – you're dismissed."

The boys clambered up from their seats, either talking excitedly or bitterly complaining about the destination of the trip.

Arthur was amongst the positive group, while Owain, his conversation partner, was among the negative.

"I thought you liked London, anyway?" Arthur said, raising an eyebrow at his brother.

"I do, I do," Owain replied, "But wouldn't you want to go somewhere more _exotic?_ A little warmer? Like… I don't know… Barbados?"

"I know this school is meant to be for well-off kids, but a destination like that for a week? I think that'd be pretty expensive," Arthur said simply.

"Okay, well Copenhagen would've been better! Or Paris, or _somewhere_ abroad!"

"You are one _very_ clever kid. Why aren't you in my German class?"

The boys looked up to see Mr. Køhler grinning down at Owain.

Owain looked up, a little confused, "Eh… French just seemed to appeal more…?"

Mr. Køhler frowned, "I was beginning to like you, too, seeing as you said Copenhagen would be better than London. You're right. But you're not right about French being better than German."

Arthur rolled his eyes a little. In the majority of his German classes, Mr. Køhler would start ranting about how French was an utterly pointless language. "I'd better go to maths. See you later, Owain," he waved at his brother, who was now trapped in a conversation with the Danish teacher.

"Ehh… Arthur-san, I couldn't help but overhear that you have maths next. Could I maybe walk with you?" Kiku slowly broke away from the crowd of boys exiting the hall, joining Arthur's side.

Arthur frowned in confusion, "Sure, but where're Feliciano and Ludwig?"

"I'm not entirely sure, actually… I haven't seen them for days."

"Oh…" Arthur said, and they fell into silence.

Kiku broke the silence, "Um… Arthur-san… I'm in a bit of a 'situation'. I was wondering, seeing as you seem to be quite logical with things like this… could you maybe help me?"

Arthur's eyebrows shot up. Him? Good at helping people? What planet was Kiku on? "Sure, I guess."

Kiku smiled gratefully, "Thank you. Well, I'm sure you've heard that I'm dating a boy called Lars? Goes to a different school – he's from the Netherlands."

"He does drugs?" Arthur asked, pretty sure he knew who Kiku was talking about.

"… Yes," Kiku admitted, "So, yes, I'm dating him… But, I feel… wrong," he paused, collecting himself, "I… I'm on 'dodgy ground' with Herac- ah, Karpusi Sensei."

"What?" Arthur blinked. He knew the relationship between Kiku and Heracles would be a bit awkward, particularly after their break up and now forbidden romance, but he thought Heracles would've controlled himself a little, especially considering his teaching status.

"He… Took me out on a date this weekend. And I really enjoyed it…"

"But…" Arthur was more than shocked at this news. He thought Kiku was meant to be _responsible_, "What if you get found out? What about Lars?"

Kiku nodded shamefully, "I know, I know… He hasn't spoken to me at all since the weekend… I don't know why. This has happened a few times before now. He just shuts down – makes no effort to contact anyone. I don't know if it's because of his own reasons, or if he's found out about Heracles and I…"

Arthur wanted to look Kiku in the eye, shake him and tell him to get a grip. He knew Kiku was better than this – Kiku was _clever_. He knew a relationship with a teacher could never work. Then again, no one predicted he'd go out with a guy that did drugs. No one predicted he'd be gay in the first place. Okay so Kiku was very unpredictable.

Just as Arthur was about ready to shout some sense into the Japanese boy – for his own good, mind – Kiku made a noise that made Arthur's words stick in his throat. He whimpered a little. And, when Kiku looked up, Arthur saw there were tears in his eyes.

Arthur couldn't shout at someone who obviously felt terrible for their actions. It was clear Kiku had beat himself up about this – he didn't need any more harsh words from Arthur.

"C'mere, Kiku," Arthur sighed, awkwardly pulling him into a half-hug, "Sit by me in maths and we'll sort this out, yeah?"

Kiku nodded tearfully as they climbed the stairs to their classroom.

Soon they were sitting down in the classroom; Arthur was listening tentatively as Kiku blabbed his heart out about the date at the weekend. Arthur found he had to hug Kiku quite a bit to stop him from crying too hard. Luckily it was the very beginning of the lesson, and students were still walking in – Alfred had yet to pass through the door, so Arthur felt safe hugging Kiku. It wasn't that he felt he was doing something wrong by hugging Kiku – he was just helping a friend. But he couldn't shift the feeling that Alfred, if he saw a hug, would somehow use it to his advantage and accuse Arthur of trying to make him jealous or something similar and false.

"Then, when we came to leave, he just hugged me and kissed my forehead. That was it – nothing else. But I think if he'd kissed me properly, then that would've been a little easier to deal with, if you know what I mean."

Arthur knew exactly what he meant, "Yeah, I understand… And, how did that make you feel, then…?"

Kiku blushed, "Ehh… well I don't want to sound unbelievable and cliché, but really… tingly inside. Like I was floating."

"I know how that feels too…" Arthur muttered, and then turned his head, facing Kiku completely, "Look, if I'm completely honest, you either need to cut things off with Lars and try and work things out with Heracles, or tell Heracles you can't go on the way you are, and continue dating Lars."

Kiku nodded, "I know, but I don't know which one to do…"

"If it were me, I think staying with Lars would be better. Although I don't think it's a good think you dating someone into drugs, I think it's better than trying to date your teacher. With Heracles you're also putting his job into jeopardy… hell you could both be taken to court, even. And anyway, from what I've heard, you've been good for Lars. I don't know him personally mind, but Gilbert's been telling me how he hasn't been smoking as much, at least."

"How on earth does Gilbert know?" Kiku blinked.

"How does Gilbert know anything?" Arthur shrugged.

Kiku smiled, "Thank you, Arthur, for the advice. I can't guarantee I'll use it, but another person's insight – especially yours – will always be helpful."

At that moment, Mr. Belischmidt marched in, silencing any conversation. Arthur smiled at Kiku, relaxing into his seat as Mr. Belischmidt sat down, until another person entered the room, captivating Arthur's attention. Of course it was Alfred, faithfully accompanied by Matthew. Usually Arthur wouldn't bat an eye at this, or at least would pretend to be indifferent. It was the fact Alfred and Matthew were coming in late _together_ – Matthew, who was never late, _ever_. And the way Alfred was standing around Matthew – almost _protectively_ – made Arthur's stomach churn with envy.

Kiku seemed to notice this too and tapped Arthur's shoulder gently in sympathy. Arthur smiled at his friend, and then looked up at Mr. Belischmidt, who was now writing things on the board – probably things Arthur should copy down.

Alfred sat down two rows in front of Arthur, not once making eye contact, Matthew quick at his tail. Arthur didn't like this at all. He was quite fond of Matthew in truth, but right now that Canadian was making him want to punch something – or preferably some_one_ – very hard.

Meanwhile, at Alfred's seat in the classroom, he was staring at the desk, trying to make his hand write.

"Don't fret so much, Alfie," Matthew smiled reassuringly, "It'll be okay, yeah?"

"I doesn't feel okay…" Alfred sighed, straightening his glasses on his nose, "Do I look okay?"

"Same old you," Matthew said, patting Alfred's cowlick, and suddenly making Alfred panic and try to flatten the sticky-out piece of hair. "Don't worry, Alfie, you're not you without that annoyingly perky flick of yours, you're fine."

Alfred nodded sheepishly, "Thanks, Mattie."

The two leaned down to start their work. Oh joy, Alfred thought as he copied down the title. Spearman Rank Correlation Co-efficient. Fun.

Alfred's somewhat odd attitude wasn't just picked up by Arthur. Alastair and Owain who were sitting a row behind Kiku and Arthur were watching the American closely.

"Summin's up with him, isn't it?" Alastair frowned at his brother, lazily pointing toward the American with his pen.

Owain nodded grimly, "Don't know what, though… It's a bit fishy to say the least."

"Wonder what he plans to do to make Arthur cry this time?" Alastair said, copying down a problem off the board as he spoke.

"I wonder…" Owain frowned. Suddenly, Alfred looked up from the ground, where he was staring worriedly, and made perfect eye contact with the Welsh boy. Owain flinched a little, shocked at Alfred's sudden gaze. He had half a mind to look away, but there was something about his big blue eyes that made Owain melt a little. Even though this boy had hurt his brother deeply, the soft part of Owain just wanted to hug and forgive him. Those big blue eyes just begged for forgiveness.

"Alastair… I think we should talk to him…" Owain muttered.

"I don't want to listen to a word that bastard has to say," Alastair obviously didn't share Owain's open mind.

"What is going on, _mon cher?"_ Francis leaned over from the row behind them, the back row, Gilbert and Antonio wanting to get a load of the gossip too. Alastair leaned away from Francis in disgust.

Owain answered, nodding towards Alfred, "Something's up with him. We reckon it's because he'd going to make a move on Arthur again – may it be a positive one or negative."

"You're right; he's not his usual arrogant self…" Antonio muttered.

"Kinda miss his obnoxious, un-awesome shouting," Gilbert murmured.

"That reminds me, Gilbert," Francis said to the German, "I need to talk to you later, can you wait for me at the end of the lesson?"

"Sure thing," Gilbert stuck out his tongue, a little confused as to what on earth Francis could want to talk about.

Feliciano, who was sitting on Owain's other side poked his head into the conversation, "So what's the situation with Arthur and Alfred?"

Owain smiled at Feliciano. He'd been a little worried about the Italian recently – he'd been uncharacteristically quiet for weeks on end, "Apparently the other night they were trying to make things up with each other, but in the end just ended up fighting."

"Sounds like me and Lovino," Antonio sighed happily, and then waved at said Italian from across the room. He'd been unlucky enough to be positioned right at the front of the class next to Ludwig – a seating plan that he was definitely not happy with.

"Never mind about Arthur and Alfred," Gilbert cut in, "What's going on with you and my brother, Feli?"

That caught everyone's attention. Gilbert had asked the question everyone else was afraid to ask. They all wheeled around on their seats to face Feliciano, immune to Mr. Belischmidt's annoyed, though ever so slightly curious glares from the front of the class.

"Well, ehh…" Feliciano looked at the floor, "I… ended it."

It took a moment to sink in.

"_What!?"_ everyone whispered harshly at once, trying not to capture their teacher's attention more than they already had.

"Yeah… Not because he was being mean or anything, no, no, just because…" Feliciano sighed, "He thinks he might be going to _London_."

"Well Feli, we're _all_ going to London – it's a school trip, but we'll be coming back!" Antonio smiled stupidly. Everyone ignored him.

"No," Feliciano cracked a slight smile, "I mean to live. Well, Oxford actually, but it's close enough…"

"Oxford? Like, _the university?"_ Francis' mouth opened.

Feliciano nodded.

"Why's he going there? He hasn't even made it through collage yet!" Alastair narrowed his eyebrows.

"Well his dad's got connections, being in the position he's in… He pulled some strings and managed to get him a guaranteed place there whenever the time is right for him to go. Mr. Belischmidt was arranging for him to go to one of the collages quite near there to get used to life on his own and everything…"

Everyone stared at him in silence. Then Alastair suddenly realised.

"Hang on. Gilbert – you're his _brother. _How don't you know this!?"

Gilbert shrugged, "My family mustn't love me!" he pouted, "I never get to know stuff about this. Besides, I haven't seen Ludwig or dad for ages."

Owain then pulled the conversation back on topic, "So why did you break it with him now?"

Feliciano sighed. He sounded ten years older than he usually sounded… Something had made him mature very quickly, and no one was quite sure if they liked this drastic change, "Well, I've realised that me being with Ludwig is holding _me_ back. I never see my friends – it's been ages since I've spoken with Kiku… It's not Ludwig's fault… It's just I think us being together will just chain us both to each other – I'll be holding back his studies, and he'll be pulling me away from my friends. I love him, of course I do. He loves me, too. But we both agreed that it was for the best… Especially if we broke it _now_. We could get used to life without each other – we can just be friends."

Everyone stared at him. Feliciano was actually feeling quite proud of himself.

Until their stares turned into disbelief.

"Bollocks. Feli, do the right thing and get back with him," Alastair shook his head, "Don't think about holding anyone back. Just be with the person you want to be with for as long as you can. You can manage to stay friends with Kiku and the others if you really try – same with Ludwig and his studies."

"I agree with Alastair, only I'd have phrased it a little nicer," Owain smiled sympathetically, "Be with him as long as you can – even if you can't stop him going to London; you can still have each other until you're forced to let go, yeah?"

Antonio smiled, "If you'd like, I could get Lovino to give you a motivational talk? Or I could get him to talk to Lovino?"

"What good would that do, Toni?" Gilbert laughed at the many mental images he was having, "That'd only cause more problems! A fucking _war_, even!"

Feliciano cut across them all with a light whimper. Everyone's head snapped up, staring at him. Then he very slowly covered his eyes and they all knew that tears were seeping out into his hands.

Everyone had seen Feliciano – it was practically a daily occurrence, his crocodile tears. But no one had seen him cry tears of sadness.

It really was heartbreaking.

Owain quickly enveloped the boy into his arms, quietly whispering words of encouragement to him, like a mother would when a child falls over and hurts their knee. Feliciano buried his face into Owain's warm shoulder, clinging to him. Everyone else just watched, awkwardly trying to think what they should say to the poor boy when he emerged from Owain's blazer.

"Thank you, everyone," Feliciano muttered under his breath, only just audible, "Your support really does mean a lot, y'know? I… really needed someone to talk to. Luckily I got all you."

"Stop being so noble and mature and just _cry_ for fuck's sake, Feli," Alastair said as nicely as he could, "Let it out. Be as immature as you want and then return to the normal Feliciano we all know and love, yeah?"

Feliciano nodded, squeezing his eyes shut.

The rest of the lesson continued in the same way, Feliciano's sobs slowly getting quieter and quieter, until he just clung to Owain, dry tearstains on his cheeks, enjoying the feeling of being rocked like he was young again.

"Is everything alright, boys?"

All of the boys looked up, looking a little guiltily at Mr. Belischmidt.

"Everything's fine, dad," Gilbert waved his father away.

"Well then I'd like you to stop talking in my lessons," Mr. Belischmidt frowned.

The bell rung out, and the students all jumped up from their seats, running out the door.

"No worries! It's not your lesson any more, so we can talk!" Gilbert answered cheekily, grabbing Francis in one arm and Antonio in the other and pulling them out the door, ignoring his father's scolding. Owain, Alastair, now closely followed by Feliciano slipped out while the head wasn't looking, so they weren't pulled up for talking, either.

Second lesson, English, passed quickly. No one was really concentrating on the task they'd been given – to write a story titled 'The Visitor' – not even Heracles was focused. Everyone was wrapped up in their own thought. No one noticed the secret little glances Kiku and Heracles shot each other, and now and then the smallest of guilty smiles.

The bell rang, signalling break. Alfred climbed up from his seat, and marched past Arthur and Kiku who gave him a confused glance, right up to Owain and Alastair – coincidently the brothers were just about to go and find Alfred themselves.

"I need to talk with you, if that's okay…" Alfred said under his breath. So this is what he'd got himself so worked up about during Maths.

"Go ahead, moron," Alastair's stare was deadly, "Let's walk and talk, shall we?"

"Alastair…" Owain muttered quietly, trying to control his brother's manners at least a little.

"No, I agree, I deserve to be spoken to like that," Alfred hung his head, "It's not fair what I did to Arthur."

The pair looked up as they started walking down the corridor, "Is this an apology? Seems he's confused, Owain, he's coming to the wrong people, after all."

"I know I should be apologising to Arthur…" Alfred sighed, "I wanted to come to you first though – apologise to you and beg that, if ever Arthur wants me back, I'll have your permission to get with him."

"Bullshit. You're just too chicken to go and apologise to Arthur himself," Alastair spat.

"… That too…" Alfred admitted.

"Go on, Alfred, carry on with what you were saying," Owain said encouragingly. Alfred smiled at Owain's support, thankful that at least he was being given a chance.

"Well, I got this idea last night, and I'm pretty convinced that, if I pull it off right Arthur might see that my apology is sincere. But I need your help."

Alastair frowned, "Count me out. Maybe I'll forgive you for what you did to my little brother in a few years. For now you're a complete bastard in my eyes, and nothing's changing tha'."

Owain sighed as Alastair stalked off moodily, "Ignore him, I'm sure he'll come around. So what was this idea of yours, then?"

Alfred smiled, "Right, well. I think you'll like this."

Owain really did like it. A grin spread across his face as Alfred told him his plan.

"Alfred, that is _genius!_ It's so _sweet_ too. If Arthur doesn't forgive you, I'll go and slay a dragon and eat it. Maybe _Alastair'll _even forgive you after this. I'll go and get Francis! He'll be _vital_ to us if we want to pull this off."

**A/N**

**Sorry this chapter kinda sucked ._. especially after the long wait ^^" I swear it's going to get better, though! That was all pretty important info, it wasn't just fillers, so no worries :) And sorry if I got your hopes up for GerIta in this chapter ;; I swear there will be some, though X'D and some Spamano X'D  
Thank you for kind, kind reviews! Over 100! :DD*hugs* I love you! And if you enjoyed, feedback is always encouraged! :D  
I'll get to work on the next chapter now, seeing as I'm in the mood X'D hopefully it'll be up sooner…  
Hopefully. X'D**


	17. Let's talk it out

**Chapter seventeen – Let's talk it out**

Meanwhile, Francis had dragged Gilbert over to a deserted area of the school, just behind the canteen. Francis stared at the ground guiltily, not radiating his usual wave of arrogance.

"You wanted to talk?" Gilbert grinned, "You're wasting awesome time of mine, Francis," he stuck his tongue out playfully.

"_Mon cher_, I didn't so much want to talk – I just… wanted to apologise," Francis swallowed his pride and met Gilbert's eyes confidently.

Gilbert stared at Francis, confused, "Thanks, man… But… what for?"

"You mean you're not annoyed at me…?" Francis narrowed his eyes in confusion, "I'm talking about the whole thing with Matthew… You _do_ know it was me who he cheated on you with?"

Gilbert shrugged, "Yeah… Actually it never even occurred to me that I should be annoyed with you."

Francis still couldn't accept it, "But… I should've refused him! I shouldn't have flirted with him! I need you to shout at me and tell me I was wrong! Gilbert, what's _wrong_ with you?"

"Woah, Francis, calm down! I've never seen you like _this_ before…" Gilbert laughed a little, but stopped himself at Francis' harsh gaze, "It's almost like _you're_ annoyed at _me_."

Francis shook his head, "_Non, non, mon cher_. But in all seriousness, what I did to you was wrong. I knowingly cheated on my boyfriend with my best friend's. That's twisted on a lot of levels. And I know you know me; I don't apologise like this unless I know I was wrong."

Gilbert weighed his head side to side, "I don't really blame you… Mattie _was_ the one that came on to you, right? And we all know you – can't resist a shag. Plus, I said it a second ago – I didn't even think to blame you, which kind of proves I'm really not bothered by it."

Francis sighed, "Well, if you're not going to shout at me, then there's really nothing I can do. I kept on putting this off because I didn't have the heart to apologise to you."

"Well, you did in the end, which is pretty awesome," Gilbert grinned roughly.

Francis smiled, satisfied, "Matthew changed you, _mon ami,_ before you dated him you'd have probably lashed out at something like this. He softened you up, but in a good way. I remember the days when you smoked."

Gilbert fake-shuddered, "Bad times, bad times. Those days were dark. Still pisses me off thinking about them. Pisses me off that Al's facing a pretty shit time, too."

"Alastair?" Francis scowled, making a noise of disgust, "He's not worth your worry."

"Francis, he's one of my best friends. Besides, you're dating Owain! Owain cares a hell of a lot about Alastair – if he were to get hurt, then Owain would be upset, too. Maybe even more upset than Alastair would be, knowing him!" Gilbert said civilly, smiling encouragingly at Francis.

Francis shifted with discomfort, "I see your point, but he's still a bastard."

Cracking a grin, Gilbert said, "That's Alastair. Bastard all over. It's why we love him. You know underneath he cares an awful lot more than he gives away. He's secretly glad you and Owain are dating."

Francis scoffed, "Whatever."

"It's true!"

"Did Owain not tell you?" Gilbert frowned, "Alastair was the one who encouraged Owain to ask you out."

Narrowing his eyes, Francis sighed moodily, "He didn't ask me out. He asked me to ask him out."

"Whatever happened, Alastair encouraged it! He gave up his utter hatred of you, gave up the cute, weird little 'relationship' he had going on with Owain, and told his brother to go and get with you. D'ya know why?"

"Why?" Francis mumbled childishly, knowing the answer.

"Because he _cares_, Francis. He cares an awful lot more than he pretends to. You know, he is _lonely_ at the minute, but not the way I feel lonely, because at least for a while, I had someone. Alastair has never had anyone, and he's convinced himself it'll always be like that, apart from the odd fuck with Elizabeth – but even that's stopped now, because she's dating that Francesca girl! He's lonely, and he doesn't realise it himself, but he cares about Owain and his brothers, he cares about me, and hell, he even cares about you."

"Well how am I meant to know that if he's a constant bastard towards me?" Francis threw his arms up in frustration.

"I told you before, Alastair just _is_ a bastard – he's like that! But you just need to take what he says as a joke. He's arrogant and selfish, but seriously, if you can get past that and learn to ignore it, you realise that actually he's extremely selfless and under confident, and genuinely a nice guy!"

Francis could tell he was loosing what had now turned into a little argument, "Maybe he needs to show that side more to actually be accepted as a nice guy! People judge me as an utter dick and I don't see you running to my side to stick up for me!"

"Yes, but Alastair has been through a hell of a lot more than you! His dad pretty much neglected him as a kid, his almost step-dad was an utter _dick_, he was on weird ground with Owain, he used to self harm when he was younger, and, Jesus, he smokes like there's no tomorrow – and that isn't even the _half_ of it!"

Francis shook his head, "We all have hardships."

"And Alastair's are worse than most people's!"

Pausing for a second, Francis ducked his head, and then met Gilbert's eyes, "What I don't understand is why you get angry with me about this, rather than me cheating with Matthew."

Gilbert frowned, "Because that concerns me – I don't give a shit about stuff like that; it's when you talk about Alastair like he's nothing!"

"Fine, I accept that I am wrong, and that I have upset you, _mon cher_," Francis sighed, "I apologise. I will think twice before insulting Alastair."

Gilbert nodded, "Thank you. Francis, you're a good guy. Don't make people view you as anything else."

"Thank you, _mon cher_," Francis smiled dryly, and opened up his arms for a hug off Gilbert, "Friends again?"

"We weren't not friends, idiot," Gilbert grinned, hugging Francis roughly and boyishly, slapping him on the back, "Lets go and get some food, I'm starving."

"Agreed."

* * *

Ludwig was doing his homework. Again. But this homework wasn't compulsory homework, no, this homework was completely voluntary. In fact, he'd practically persuaded the teacher to give it to him. Just something to keep his mind busy, really. Actually, all week he'd done nothing but work. He knew exactly why – to keep his mind from straying to Feliciano.

Naturally his permanent position of being hunched over his desk in low lighting was worrying quite a few people. Even though Feliciano had only just broken up with him, they still shared a room, and he was constantly asking Ludwig if he was okay, and encouraging him to take a break. Gilbert had been over a few times, although he knew nothing of the break up, he'd noticed his brother's behaviour was a little out of the ordinary. It warmed Ludwig's heart a little to know that people still cared about him.

But, as Feliciano was out, and Gilbert was doing God-knows-what, Ludwig found himself, once again, in his cramped position on his desk, trying to polish up on his weakest subject, English. Although it was his weakest, he was still obtaining very high A grades, now and then a low A*. It was safe to say that Ludwig was extremely intelligent.

For better or for worse, Ludwig found his essay had been interrupted by a sharp knock on the door. He planned on leaving it; if it was Gilbert, he didn't want to talk, and Feliciano had a key. He couldn't see a reason for anyone else knocking at his dorm, unless they wanted the company of his roommate.

Sadly, the knocking continued, and continued, until Ludwig slammed his hands down on the keyboard, creating an un-readable mash of letters to appear on the Word document in front of him. Sighing, he got to his feet, yanking the door open.

To find _Lovino_ standing at his doorstep.

"Feliciano's out," Ludwig said flatly, making to shut the door, but was stopped by Lovino shoving his foot in between the gap.

"You think I don't know that? He's round at _my_ dorm. I came here for you." Lovino spat.

"What?" Ludwig narrowed his eyes.

"You heard right, I know, I can't believe it either. Just let me in, offer me a drink, and then after I've spoken to you, I can go."

Dumbfounded at the practically impossible situation he'd managed to wind up in, Ludwig just blinked, opening the door and signalling for Lovino to come in.

Maybe Gilbert was right. Maybe he_ was_ working to hard – he'd started hallucinating.

"You gunna offer me a drink, potato?" Lovino called over. At least he'd dropped the 'bastard' part, like he'd promised two years ago, "I'll have coke, thanks."

"Fine, fine, whatever," Ludwig shook his head, still a little dazed. He quickly filled up two glasses, and sat opposite Lovino.

"What do you want, then?" he asked, wanting his time with the Italian to be over as quick as possible. Not only was he unbearable company because of his generally appalling attitude, he also looked painfully like his younger brother.

"I want to talk, that's all. Did you know that Feli's crying his eyes out on Antonio's lap right now?" Lovino narrowed his eyes.

Ludwig managed to keep his flinch internal, "I can't help that, if I remember correctly, he was the one that broke up with me."

"And why do you think he did that? I hate to admit that you know my brother as well as I do, and that we _both_ know that there was a very good reason behind him breaking up with you. He didn't do it out of boredom, spite, or just on a whim. This was one of the very rare things he actually thought about before doing. And now, even though he knows it was the right thing to do, he's crying his eyes out on my bed. Why do you think that is, hm?" Lovino sounded too calm to be in control – he sounded like someone about to loose it, big time.

Still, Ludwig edged ever closer to crossing Lovino's very clear, bright red, angry line. "I don't know. I've never been too good at relationships. I pride myself in my knowledge, not my social skills."

"_That is exactly my point! _For someone so fucking clever, you're so fucking _stupid!_ Please, no funny business now, but do you seriously know why Feli broke up with you?" Lovino demanded.

"Actually I don't, if I'm honest," Ludwig said.

"Now, do you _really_ believe that, or are you just saying it?"

Ludwig didn't answer.

Then Lovino changed. It was a very different change, and, although Ludwig knew an awful lot of adjectives, he couldn't quite pick one to describe the change in Lovino. It was almost like he sounded encouraging, but cynical at the same time. Apathetic, but worried. It truly was a mystery.

"We _both_ know you know, Ludwig," Lovino called him by his first name? "Kiku tried to tell you, Feliciano tried to tell you, Gilbert tried to tell you… But you just didn't _listen_. You're _good_ at listening; you need to listen to the people that actually care about you, rather than absorbing in meaningless facts. Ludwig, please, I'll ask again. Why did Feliciano break up with you?"

There was a pause.

"Because I was taking him for granted," Ludwig admitted with great difficulty, his voice a little strained, "I just accepted that he'd love me even if I practically ignored him. I put my work before him."

Lovino nodded, "Yes. Though Feliciano still loves you. Trust me, he never stops reminding Toni and me."

"Will I ever be able to get him back…?" Ludwig said, "_Can_ I ever get him back?"

"Well, I think you're a bastard for neglecting him, but hell, at least you didn't do it out of spite or anything. The problem here isn't people not letting you date him, or Feliciano rejecting you. The problem is _you_ – you need to get yourself in the right frame of mind to date him, and understand that if you do what you did to my brother before, then the relationship will end in the same way. You need to find a way to balance your education, work or whatever and Feliciano. Don't waste your youth, Ludwig, I don't care that I sound like a granddad – but you'll never get this time back. Don't look back at it in the future and regret it."

Ludwig, still a little shocked at Lovino's changed attitude, nodded, "You're right."

There was a silence.

"Thank you, Lovino. I've never really liked you, and I know you've felt the same, but I've always admired you capability to act exactly how you are and not let other's judgements influence you. And the Lovino I'm seeing today is a lot different to the usual you, but I know that you're telling the truth. This is _you_ talking. And you know what? I like you."

"Not too bad yourself," Lovino shrugged, "You caught me in a good mood. Your water's filtered. It calmed me down."

Ludwig smiled, "Thanks, Lovino. When you next see Feliciano… Tell him that it's not over between us. I will change for him."

Lovino frowned, "Tell him yourself!"

"But…" Ludwig tried to come up with a good excuse as to why he couldn't see Feliciano. The only one he could come up with was that he was far to scared to do so, but he'd never admit that to Lovino. As far as Lovino believed, Ludwig wasn't even capable of feeling fear. Ludwig didn't really want to break the Italian's delusions.

"'But' is not a reasonable excuse! You can go get your lazy ass down to my room and talk to my brother. _Right now."_

Lovino could turn from almost nice to his usual self in less than a few minutes, Ludwig noted with a sigh.

"Fine, fine," Ludwig couldn't think of much else to say. He attempted to prepare what he was going to say to Feliciano, but his mind was as blank as Feliciano's homework sheets, so he knew he was going to have to improvise once face to face with the Italian.

Standing up and stretching his limbs, Ludwig sighed, "Right. Let's do this."

* * *

Arthur opened the door to his temporary dorm he was sharing with Francis and Owain, only to be greeted with…

… Material?

Pink, purple, ice blue – every colour of material you could want scattered the floor. Some silky looking, some velvety and inviting to touch – others downright disturbing, like slutty-looking netted stuff… and was that _Lycra?_

One thing was for sure, Arthur was very, very confused why his dorm had been turned into a sewing shop.

"I'm back?" Arthur called uncertainly.

There was a little shriek and mumblings from the door leading into the main room. Arthur raised an eyebrow, utterly baffled, but when he tried to open the door, he found it was jammed. Frowning and looking down to see what was blocking his way in, he saw a shiny new pair of bright red converse.

The same pair Owain had been fanboying (though it was more like fan_girling)_ about only the other day.

"Owain, what the hell? Let me in! And what's with decorating your apartment into a seamstress' shop? Where did you even get _Lycra!?_"

"Go away!" his brother seemed to squeak nervously, "Francis and I are… busy!"

"Doing what?" Arthur frowned, and then got the euphemism, "Oh. It better not be on my bed!"

"No, no, nope! Just… Don't mind us! And don't come back for a _long_ time. Maybe even stay the night with someone else!"

"Someone else? Who?" Arthur demanded, but then cut across himself, "Hang on… if you're doing 'stuff' with Francis, why do you need all this material? And why are you wearing converse?"

Silence for a second, and then, "Jesus Arthur – stop being so nosy about my love-life!"

"But-! God, I give up," Arthur said, exasperated, though he was only partly serious, "Well… I'll go and talk to Kiku, then?"

"Whatever you want, just don't come back here in a hurry!" said Owain's voice through the door.

"Love you too," Arthur mumbled, rolling his eyes, "Well… see you tomorrow."

Not waiting for a reply, Arthur made his way out of the dormitory, and headed down the corridor to Kiku's room. What had been up with Owain? There was obviously something he wasn't telling Arthur, but that wasn't the only odd thing about his behaviour. It wasn't really the nature of Owain and Francis' relationship to plan ahead. They'd never made an effort to warn Arthur of sexual activities, something the blonde had discovered on his own after walking in on them on several occasions. Why so protective now?

His thoughts were cut short by a figure standing outside Kiku's door who didn't really look like he should be there. He was very different to the type of guy you'd imagine waiting for the sweet Japanese boy. Arthur would imagine someone that stood outside Kiku's door would be quiet, much like Kiku himself, short, cute, a bit geeky. The person leaning against the wall and chewing on the end of a lit cigarette was someone who definitely _didn't_ look suitable for Kiku.

Then it clicked.

This must be Kiku's very shady boyfriend.

_Well,_ thought Arthur, _you've been wanting to hear about this guy for a while. Maybe some detective work would be suitable here._

"Hello," Arthur greeted, trying to sound cheerful, but not patronisingly so.

The guy looked up from the ground, "Hey," he mumbled, giving Arthur a mouthful of smoke, "And you are?"

"Arthur Kirkland, Kiku's friend. Is it safe to assume you're…"

"Lars, yes. I'm sure you've heard all about me. People enjoy bitching behind my back."

_He's awfully bitter,_ Arthur said to himself.

"Well… if you're Kiku's boyfriend, then why're you waiting out here?" Arthur said.

"Because I'm wondering if I still want to be his boyfriend…" Lars said, finally looking up to meet Arthur's eyes.

Arthur had a feeling he knew what this was about, but issued for Lars to continue.

Sinking to the floor, and inviting Arthur to do the same, Lars took a long drag of his cigarette, and then elaborated, "He hurt me pretty bad. I know he still has a thing for that English teacher… It's painfully obvious. I don't really care that Kiku's struggling to get over a broken heart – hell, so am I. But I just wish he'd _tell _me rather than going on secrete dates with him."

"Oh yeah, I heard about that…" Arthur hung his head, feeling torn between sticking up for Kiku and consoling this obviously heartbroken Lars, "There is one piece of advice I can give you."

"Hm?"

"If you do break up with him, make sure you're serious. People see break ups as normality, that if you change your mind then you can just apologise and go back to how things were. I've had the unfortunate experience of a pretty upsetting break up quite recently, and I know very well that they're not a little thing that can be forgotten about. So promise me this, if you do break up with Kiku… try and make it painless, and… make sure you're one hundred percent certain on your decision, and that unless a miracle happens, you won't date again. That this is the end."

Lars nodded, "No offence, Arthur or whatever your name was, I'd have done that anyway," he cracked a smile, "But thank you for your concern. It's obvious you care a lot about Kiku's feelings."

Arthur nodded, "He's one of my best friends," that was weird, Arthur thought to himself. He'd never really considered Kiku to be a best friend, but now he'd said it, it did make a lot of sense.

Standing up, Lars clapped his hands, "But y'know, you have got me thinking. In proportion to the whole world, does it really matter that much? I could just… forget about it, surely?" Lars shook his head, "I don't know. But I do know I need to think about this before running into it. Thanks, mate."

"No problem," Arthur nodded, also clambering to his feet.

"Why did you say you were here?"

"I was going to ask Kiku to sleepover, because my roommate's busy with his boyfriend," Arthur frowned, but quickly replaced it with a good-natured smile, "But I can tell Kiku will be equally busy, even if it's not in a sexual way. I'll go and ask Gilbert to spare me a few pillows. Good luck, Lars."

Lars nodded, "Thanks, Arthur."

"No problem at all."

**A/N**

**Aha. Ahahaha. Oops. Again.  
I swear I don't mean to do this.  
Updates went from once a day to once every three weeks or something stupid. Congratulations me and my regression.  
But yes! Hello! Please love me.  
More apologies; I'm sorry the chapters are UNEVENTFUL. Grr. Filler chapters that are needed. UGH. I wish I had the ability to make them more interesting. But yes, there will be a turning point soon, and hopefully that'll compel me to write more. Hahalolprobablynotthough.  
Thank you for support, guys! I love you so much~  
LOVE YOUS.**


	18. I'm sorry

**Chapter eighteen – I'm sorry**

Ludwig stood in front of Lovino and Antonio's dormitory, staring at his own feet. A door had never looked so terrifying to him before. It was almost as if it's sprouted hairy arms and legs and was threatening to choke him. Of course, his hard exterior didn't give away any emotion – he made sure of that, especially as Lovino was standing next to him with a smug grin, knowing that he was probably terrified out of his wits.

"Go on then," Lovino sounded all too happy, "Open the door and apologise to my brother."

Ludwig clenched his fist, and tried to move his arm to open the door. Nothing happened.

"What's the matter?" Lovino said, putting on a mock curios, concerned voice.

Ludwig glared down at the Italian, "I-I… can't."

"Yes you can! A big, scary guy like you isn't afraid of a little wood, is he?" You could tell Lovino was trying very hard not to laugh.

"Shut up, will you? It's what's behind the door that's…" Ludwig didn't want to finish his sentence.

"Fine, seems I do everything around here," all of a sudden, Lovino's smirk had gone, and he started to sound a little more serious. He reached down for the door handle, but before he pushed the door open, he caught Ludwig's gaze for less than a second. Ludwig knew what the stare meant – it wasn't a stare of encouragement, but a warning. If Feliciano was hurt as the product of all this, Ludwig would have Lovino to answer to.

The door was pushed open, and a call from Antonio in the main room came through another open door in front of them, "Hey Lovi, come on through!"

"Come here, Toni," Lovino called back, giving Ludwig a warning look.

"Hmm? What's up?" Antonio poked his head though the open door to look into the little porch-thing every dorm had, and saw Ludwig, "Oh. You."

_Why does no one like me!?_ Ludwig was mentally banging his head against a wall. He could be a dick at times – he could admit that! But he _could_ be a nice guy! Nicer than Lovino, by all means; so why on earth was he hated more than the sour Italian?

"Yes, it's me," Ludwig said weakly, "Can I talk to Feliciano, please?"

Lovino could obviously see Antonio's restraint, "Trust me, Toni, you want to see this."

Antonio frowned; Ludwig could tell if Lovino hadn't have been there, a very different ending would've played out. "Fine. He's in the kitchen. I just got him to stop crying."

Ludwig nodded, knowing if he said anything else it'd probably be ignored. Hesitantly, he slipped through the door, quickly pacing across the length of the main room – he was afraid if he went too slow then he might just chicken out of it. He reached the kitchen door and took a deep breath, clearing his throat gently, and was about to start flattening his hair before he realised he was being ridiculous.

Lifting his arm which now felt as heavy as lead, he gently tapped the wood.

"Toni, is that you? Or is it Lovi?" Feliciano's voice sounded quite raw. Antonio had obviously been telling the truth about the crying.

Ludwig began to open the door while saying, "Eh… No. It's… me."

He stood quite awkwardly in the doorway as Feliciano gawked at him.

"… Hi…" Ludwig broke the silence awkwardly.

"Hi…" Feliciano matched, now avoiding Ludwig's gaze.

Ludwig then played out many scenarios in his head. From here he could try and create light conversation and make things ten times more awkward, or he could not beat around the bush and just get straight to the point. The latter would be a lot less painfully awkward.

"Look, Feliciano…" Ludwig said, he didn't feel that he had the right to call Feliciano by his nickname right now, "I came here to apologise."

Feliciano said nothing, but just pointed to the chair opposite him on the table, obviously issuing for Ludwig to sit down. Ludwig happily obliged, and then continued.

"I'm not going to pretend that I was a bad boyfriend to you – hell I was a bad friend full stop. I took you for granted, and no one should ever do that. I acted as if you would always be there for me, no matter how much I neglected you. I put equations before you – little markings on a piece of paper before the person I love. It doesn't even make sense to me. I can understand it was you breaking up with me – I don't blame you – but, I'm here to at least make things a good end between us if you won't take me back."

Feliciano lifted his head up off the table, "You know I didn't break up with you because you were neglecting me – I broke up with you because I felt I was holding you back, Ludwig."

Ludwig rubbed his forehead, "And you shouldn't have thought that – it's just so typical _you_ to think that! Always putting other people before you… It's stupid – counterproductive… I can't make sense of it… But I can definitely say it's one of your best qualities. Even though it makes no sense, it's a wonderful thing to do. One of the most human things to do. I love you for it, I still do."

Feliciano smiled slightly, "But Ludwig, you're going to have to choose. I can't go into the same position we were in before – not just for your sake, but for _mine_ too… Lovino and Antonio made me realise what you just said there – that you _were_ being unfair to me. I don't particularly _mind_, but we can't let it go back to that, right? So you can either date me again, or you can go and study to become the great man you could be. I'm not saying if you want to date me you don't get to study at all, just not _all_ hours of the day. Maybe you could do my homework, too," he added jokingly.

Ludwig smiled, taking Feliciano's hand, "I don't even have to think about that decision."

Feliciano smiled.

"I'll take the studying." Ludwig said flatly.

There was a moment of silence, Feliciano started at him, stunned.

Ludwig then burst out laughing, "Joking, joking!"

Feliciano still blinked, "You made a _joke?"_

"Well you did always say I needed a better sense of humour," Ludwig mumbled, now feeling a little embarrassed, "I can tell by your reaction that it wasn't the best place to joke."

"Ehh… not really," Feliciano giggled nervously, "But at least you tried?"

Ludwig smiled, "I guess I'll never really have a sense of humour."

"Don't worry, I still love you~" Feliciano squeezed Ludwig's hand a little, and leaned in for a kiss.

Now, although Feliciano and Ludwig had dated for quite a while, Ludwig still wasn't used to the whole kissing thing. He always felt he did it quite badly. So this time, he took extra care when placing his lips atop of Feliciano's. He quite liked it when Feliciano took control. Despite his childish nature, Feliciano's Italian heritage showed through the minute things got a little romantic, and he proved he could be very mature.

So, as Feliciano began taking control of the kiss, Ludwig melted into the usual routine of their kisses. He had missed them an awful lot. This definitely beat studying.

Unaware of the embrace going on in his kitchen, Lovino had begun to feel a little peckish. He listened at the kitchen door, and when he made sure there was no shouting, he decided it would probably be safe to go and grab a churro or two for him and Antonio.

He didn't expect to see the sight of Feliciano _on the table, _slowly climbing on top of Ludwig's lap.

Lovino cursed, hating to see Feliciano be remotely sexual – it was just _wrong,_ damn it! Everyone knew that Feliciano was as innocent as they came! "Right okay you two. That's enough. It's weird enough for you to be doing this – but on _my_ table? That's where I'm going to _eat!"_

They ignored him and carried on.

"Hey!"

"Lovino what's goin- _oooh._ Right." Antonio wondered over, and answered his own question as soon as he lay eyes on the scene, "And on the table too…"

"Exactly what I was thinking. Right. I'll grab Feli, you take the German," Lovino rolled up his sleeves.

Antonio was about to protest, but Lovino had already begun charging at his brother, wrestling him off the German. Shrugging, Antonio joined in; doing his best to drag the chair Ludwig was sitting on away from the Italian.

Soon the Spaniard and Italian somehow managed to carry both Ludwig and Feliciano to the door, place them outside – though Lovino had been very tempted to throw Ludwig across the hall. The only thing stopping him was the minor factor that Ludwig was _very_ heavy – and locked the door on them, ignoring any complaints Feliciano moaned through the door.

"Jesus they're animals…" Lovino frowned, sitting down on the sofa.

"Well to be fair, we're not much better," Antonio grinned flirtatiously.

"Yeah, but we're _older_… and we know what we're doing… kind of."

"Shut up and kiss me, Lovi."

"Obliged."

Antonio and Lovino didn't pay any attention to the fact that Ludwig and Feliciano were doing the very same thing, only on their doorstep. At least things seemed to have fixed themselves.

* * *

The following day at lunch, Arthur was rushing down the corridor, attempting to get to the canteen as quick as he could without looking like he was running. He was incredibly annoyed and frustrated, as Alastair had somehow managed to get him in a detention, by throwing a paper aeroplane at Mr. Belischmidt, and planting another one in Arthur's pocket, making him look like the guilty party. He had no idea what his brother's motive for doing such a random act had been, but nonetheless, it'd given him half an hour with his beloved head teacher writing out lines.

His brothers – all of them in fact, well apart from Peter – had been acting very weird the past day or two. First there was the random act of Owain decorating their apartment with material, and then Arthur had attempted to find Alastair all day yesterday to ask him if he could stay the night, but no one knew where he was. Not even _Gilbert_. It was like he'd disappeared off the face of the Earth, almost. The Twins were also being odd. Arthur had eventually begged at their doorstep to stay over with them. They'd agreed, but all night they read him _fairytales._ It was incredibly random, and Arthur couldn't work out what was going on.

Little did he know, he was about to find out.

Arthur finally reached the canteen, hoping there'd still be some food left over for him, even though there was only twenty minutes of lunch left. Arthur was in such a rush he didn't notice that there was quite a crowd around the canteen, loud murmurings, flashes of cameras… and girls from Coverack were there too, apparently.

But Arthur was so focused on his food; he just walked straight past this.

He nearly walked straight past the very obvious crowd around a little cluster of tables. He only looked up because he accidentally walked into a girl from Coverack. He was about to carry on walking until he stopped himself – asking the obvious question of _why is a girl in an all-boy's school?_ This then led him on to see the crowd of both boys and girls all muttering excitedly.

"There he is!" came a familiar voice, and out of no where, Arthur spun around, and found Owain launching himself on to Arthur.

"Owain, what the hell's going on?" Arthur demanded.

"You'll see," Owain had a particularly malicious grin on his face, and covered Arthur's eyes with his hands.

"Get off me! I'm trying to get food for God's sake! _Owain!"_ Arthur really wasn't in the mood for this.

"Don't worry, little brother," suddenly Alastair's voice appeared, though Arthur couldn't tell from where, "You'll have forgotten about your stomach very soon."

Suddenly Arthur felt his feet being pulled off the ground. Alastair was lifting him up!

"Jesus – Alastair, _put me down!"_ Arthur growled. Owain must still be keeping his hands over Arthur's eyes, as Arthur was still as blind as he was angry.

Alastair had now lifted Arthur up across his shoulder, Arthur still squirming and demanding to be let down. Both Owain and Alastair exchanged knowing grins, winking to one another, and brought the fuming little Arthur through to the centre of the crowd.

Letting Arthur down on to his feet, Alastair patted his little brother's hair, "Trust us on this one, mate."

Owain positioned Arthur, making sure he was in the right place, and then very slowly lifted his hand away, giving Arthur his sight back.

As soon as his vision came into focus, Arthur wondered if Alastair had perhaps knocked him out, and this was some distort, weird dream he was having.

In front of Arthur, on top of a tale and sitting on a chair, blushing like fury, was Alfred F. Jones…

_In a dress_.

Not just _any_ dress. One that looked like a reject design at the Disney Costume Department. It just screamed '_I AM A LITTLE GIRL. GIVE ME UNICORNS_.'

And Alfred was wearing it.

Arthur very nearly burst into fits of laughter, but something stopped him. He wasn't entirely sure what. It might be that he wasn't convinced what he was seeing was real, or that he was still too angry, or the very vulnerable expression on Alfred's face.

Of all the things Arthur could've thought to say, he only managed to stutter out, "…_What!?"_

The silence was deafening. The crowd waited with baited breath, their gazes flicking from Arthur, to Alfred, and back to Arthur again. Owain had tensed up, and was digging his nails nervously into Alastair's arm. If Arthur didn't like his pride and glory of a dress, Owain felt he'd probably be more upset than Alfred.

"I wanted to apologise, Arthur," Alfred said quietly, though voice full of confidence. Apparently the dress he was wearing wasn't embarrassing at all, or at least he wasn't showing any embarrassment.

"And you felt it very important to wear a dress and sit in the middle of the canteen to do so!?" Arthur demanded – he wasn't sure if the sudden embarrassment and rage he was feeling was for himself or for Alfred's sake.

"Actually yes," Alfred said with a smile, "Remember why we started to fight?"

"Of course. You were a complete dick and refused to admit it."

"Exactly. And now, nearly four months after we still haven't made up after something so simple – that's not quite right, don't you think? So I came to the conclusion, quite a while ago, actually, that this isn't a simple argument for you. Obviously something I said then hurt you massively."

"Well _yeah, _I was kind of assuming you'd already know that – it wasn't too hard for anyone else to understand, after all," Arthur spat, getting more and more pissed off by the second.

"Okay, well I just realised it – I'm stupid! But let me carry on. I figured that me calling you a girl obviously upset you."

Arthur began clapping sarcastically, but Alfred continued regardless.

"So I thought – 'How can I get Arthur to forgive me?' and came up with two conclusions. Either show you that it was okay to have a bit of a feminine side, or to show you that I was wrong when calling you a girl."

"And how exactly does this," Arthur gestured rudely to the hideous dress, "show either of those points?"

"To feel like how you felt when I called you a girl! To show it's wrong and I know it's wrong!" Alfred insisted, now not sounding so sure of himself.

"So you're _mocking _me?" Arthur said in disbelief.

"No! Arthur, _listen _to me! I think part of the problem here is that every time I come to fix things with us, you act all sour – turn your back and refuse to listen to what I have to say. And the rare times you do listen, you listen with cynical ears, twisting my words and not even trying to see things from my point of view," Alfred had now jumped on to the floor, had grabbed hold of Arthur's arm, and was holding it very tightly.

Arthur tried to escape his grasp casually, but Alfred's grip was too strong. Arthur decided to let Alfred grab his arm all he wanted. Only when it began tingling and getting numb would Arthur attempt to pull it away. "Oh go on then. Tell me your sob story."

"I will!" Alfred gritted his teeth, "I didn't particularly _enjoy_ our argument – you think I didn't regret the things I'd said to you immediately? I was suffering too when we broke up. Okay, I'll admit – it was my _fault_ I was suffering, but I missed you. I was too much of a coward to come out to apologise to you, which again, is my fault. But then once I built up the courage to admit I was wrong to you – which is a very hard thing to do, I'll have you know – you batted me down without a second thought! I've said this all before and I'll say it again – you're not the only victim in this!"

"You're still feeding yourself delusional lies, I see, Alfred."

"_There you go again!_ Arthur, you're proving my point further! And another thing – you always think that everything I do is out to get to you; to hurt you and annoy you. Perhaps I'm not being a dick to you all the time. Perhaps sometimes, despite everything you think of me, I _am_ trying to do something nice for you. A perfect example is what's going on right now – I come to apologise to you, wearing a mortifying _dress_, trying to keep my cool and apologise to you; I've probably lowered myself to as low as I can possibly get, I'm vulnerable, I'm a mess both inside and out, because no offence to Owain, this is a hideous dress, I'm scared, I'm apologising, and I'm _admitting_ all of this! Do you know how hard that _is?_ And then here you are accusing me of being a dick to you, and being heartless, and that everything I do is to hurt you. I think I just proved my point that you're wrong."

No one said a word.

Arthur stared at Alfred, expression giving nothing away.

Finally, swallowing, Arthur said quite dryly, "I think the problem here is neither of us, for a long time, could see what we were doing wrong. We thought our behaviour was perfectly acceptable – but the _other_ person saw these 'acceptable' qualities, and found them offensive. Only now we're realising just how wrong we both were."

Alfred raised an eyebrow, "Is that an apology, Arthur?"

Arthur took a deep breath, "Yes."

Alfred nodded, "Good. Then I'm sorry too. For everything I said, and for acting to childishly. And for looking like a complete twat."

"No need to apologise for that last one – that's just normal for you," Arthur said, a hint of a smile to his voice.

A grin spread across Alfred's face, and he threw his arms around Arthur. Arthur smiled into Alfred's shoulder; until his smile suddenly disappeared as he realised Alfred was shaking. Why on earth was he _shaking?_ Arthur pulled out of the hug, to see huge tears seeping out of Alfred's eyes.

Arthur knew exactly what to do. Keeping hold of Alfred, he quickly made his way over to Owain.

"Look, I need to get Alfred out of here – have a talk with him. Cover for me the last two lessons, will you? Just say I was ill or something," he said in an undertone to his brother, who was nodding quickly.

"I'm glad it worked out for you," Owain smiled, though he obviously looked a little distraught that both Alfred and Arthur detested the dress. Owain was quite pleased with it, if he was honest.

"It hasn't been fixed yet. Don't get your hopes up – I know I'm not. I want it to work. But you know me and Alfred – one of us could say something very stupid. Most likely me," Arthur sighed, pinching his forehead. He was trying to calm himself down; come across as annoyed and short as to avoid embarrassment, though on the inside it felt like his stomach had entered a gymnastics event in the Organ Olympics.

Arthur and Alfred were making an escape out the back of the canteen just as the bell went. The crowd seemed torn between doing the right thing and going to class or doing the thing they all wanted to do and go to follow Arthur and Alfred. Luckily for the pair, Alastair, who was looking particularly threatening today, seemed to make up the crowd's minds that their lessons were _a lot_ more important than a bit of gossip.

Owain waited patiently for Alastair at the door as the crowd cleared out. By now Arthur and Alfred had scampered out, probably to either of their rooms. Owain told Francis to go ahead to class without him, as he wanted to chat with Alastair. However, even once he was finished scaring the whole crowd out of the canteen he stayed where he was, making no signals he was planning to follow Owain out the door. Confused, the Welsh boy wondered up to his brig brother.

"Not coming to class?"

"Not likely," Alastair frowned, "Never know with those two. Might start biting each other's necks off."

Owain matched Alastair's expression, "Well go and check on them, then?"

"If you'd broken up with Francis and just got back together with him, would you want me looming over your shoulder?" Alastair said, raising an eyebrow.

"Good point," Owain chewed on his lip. "Well if I were you, I'd just sit outside the room by the door. The walls aren't particularly soundproof, so if they start shouting you'll be able to hear them and jump in as the dashing Scottish hero."

"Hm. I like that."

"Well of course _you_ would you narcissist," Owain grinned cheekily. "Go on, go and spy on our little brother, then. I'm off to class; I don't particularly want a detention."

"Have fun," Alastair said with a genuine smile, "Oh, and Owain?"

"Mm?"

"Your dress was very well made."

Owain spun around with a beaming smile on his face, "I'm glad you agree with me!"

Chuckling, Alastair turned to leave, "Go on with ya. See you later, Owain."

"Bye, Al!"

**A/N**

**Ahaha. I'm back for the end of the world! The world can't end without me – kind of – getting Alfie and Artie (and Luddy and Feli) back together again :') and this time it is the real deal. I promise.  
But we're not over just yet! I can't **_**exactly**_** remember what problems I have to fix (but don't worry. I will re read it and know what's what… probably) but they will be fixed. I can't guess how many chapters we have left, if I'm honest X'D  
:3 good luck with the apocalypse, everyone.  
And happy Christmas, because let's be realistic, I'm probably not going to update before then... X'D  
HAVE A GOOD NEW YEAR. AND GET ALL THE PRESENTS YOU WANT!  
Love you all!**


	19. Let's hope the fighting's over for now

**Chapter Nineteen – Let's hope the fighting's over for now.**

Arthur had quickly escaped back to Alfred's dorm, as it was closest to the hall. He threw the unlocked door open, issuing for Alfred, who was bright red and still sniffing slightly, to go in before him. Soon the door was shut and locked, and Arthur stood, staring at Alfred, who'd buried his face in his palms, and had his knees up close to his body, acting like some sort of shield.

"You're completely mortified, aren't you…?" Arthur sighed, tone a lot softer than he expected.

Alfred nodded sadly.

"You… You let my brothers do all this to you – let yourself be embarrassed by this – upset yourself like this… to prove a point to me?"

Alfred nodded again.

"Jesus Christ you don't half make me look like a complete dick…"

When Alfred didn't reply, Arthur realised that he was taking the wrong approach towards this. So, with a deep breath he shook himself, and sat on the bed next to Alfred, gently placing a hand on the American's wrist.

"Look… I'm no good at this. You know me well enough to know that I'm _shit_ at admitting to being wrong, or expressing what I… _feel_," Arthur nearly spat out the word 'feel', already disliking how emotional and sentimental he sounded, "In fact, I think anyone knows that about me. I don't exactly hide my cold exterior. So I'll give it a go… The… _apologising._ But don't blame me if I do it wrong."

Arthur took a deep breath, trying to control his breathing, as he could feel his eyes tingling a bit. He was _not_ going to cry, for fuck's sake.

"Alfred… I… I know I've treated you badly. I know I do things that are 'out-of-order', as such, and I do regret that. I find it hard to seem… _amorous _towards you – I don't know – my brain's just weird. Admitting love… I know it's a lovely, wonderful thing, but I just see it as… _Pitiful_. No wait that sounds wrong. I mean, whenever I say something like that, it's like I'm admitting to having emotions. I don't like to admit to emotions, I much like to keep to myself. Damn I'm getting off the point. What I'm _trying_ to say is… Alfred… you don't know how much you mean to me – now, I know you're thinking 'oh of course I do, Arthur's just being bashful – but _no,_ you don't. And I'll tell you how I know that – it's because _I _don't even realise how much I fucking adore you, and how much of you has become a massive part of my own personality. I was frosty, mean and generally not a nice person the whole time we were fighting – more so than usual, and that's because I fucking _love_ you, Alfred Jones. I overreacted at what you said – I should've realised that you _really_ didn't know that you'd hurt me – I should've explained it better, and just accepted your apology, because then we could've just gotten this whole thing over with and you wouldn't be sitting here in that fucking dress.

"That's another thing that makes me feel like such a dick. You did all this for me. You humiliated yourself, just for me. Now I know Alastair's put me in drag before, but that was different. I suppose… as you say, I'm more feminine than you – I didn't _enjoy_ it, but I could… wave it away, if you like. You though, this seriously petrifies you, doesn't it? And you went through that fear and pain to say you were sorry. Jesus I do _not_ deserve you. Hell even the first time I laid eyes on you, I was a judgemental, frosty bastard. It was only until you decided to become my friend did I start opening up. You made me who I am now – I'm not exaggerating when I'm saying you picked me up made me one thousand times better than who I originally was. I don't appreciate you enough. And… for that I hope you can forgive me."

Alfred was no longer sobbing. In fact, he was gazing at Arthur with interest. Of course, Arthur didn't know this – he was staring at the floor, his face beet red with humiliation for admitting such things to Alfred. But Alfred still continued to gaze at him, in _more_ than interest. Both in awe and pity. Awe because he knew Arthur struggled with things like this, as the fact he was admitting it all now was incredibly impressive. Pity, well, because Arthur found it hard to do so. Like it was a sign of weakness.

"Arthur, look at me," Alfred said kindly. Arthur met Alfred's gaze hesitantly, like he was about to break eye-contact at any moment. Alfred wasn't having any of that. He carefully reached his hand up to cup Arthur's wet cheek, forcing Arthur to keep their gazes unbroken.

"Arthur – _thank you." _Alfred said simply, "That is all I ever wanted from you. We both know what I did wrong, and I regret that greatly, but now, don't you see? We're both on the same level. We both did wrong, we were both idiots, we both realised what we did wrong, and now finally we're both apologising. What's more, we're both still in love."

There was a pause, until Arthur broke it by saying, "Well I think I'm a little bit above you, seeing as you're still in that fucking dress."

Alfred laughed, sniffing a bit, looking down at the hideous shade of pink, "God yeah, nearly forgot about that. I'd better get changed." He clambered up, walking over to the wardrobe and stripping the dress carefully off as he went. He would've quite liked to have ripped it off, but decided that wouldn't be fair to poor Owain, who'd given up precious revision time to make it. Who knew, maybe in the future he'd be glad he kept it 'for the memories'.

Alfred felt a little down that such a sweet moment had been broken between he and Arthur, but the bubble of happiness soon erased his negativity. He and Arthur were together again, sharing moments, and mucking them up when Arthur said something cute or funny. Yes, this was how he liked it, Alfred thought. This was a good routine to be in.

Just as he took the dress off, Alfred heard a little noise from behind him. In normal circumstances, the noise would be completely inaudible. However, as there was literally silence surrounding them Alfred could've picked any sound up, whether it be a feather floating to the ground or an elephant attempting to jump.

It didn't take the brains of an archbishop to work out what'd made the sound. Arthur's red face was evidence enough.

Alfred grinned, raising an eyebrow cockily.

"It's… It's been a long time since I've seen…" Arthur issued to Alfred's bare chest.

"Oh you like it, then?" Alfred grinned, liking the attention.

Arthur nodded, avoiding Alfred's gaze.

"Y'know I'm slightly disappointed that you're not paying any attention to more… _lower_ regions, Arthur. I am in my underpants, after all…" Alfred said, slowly getting closer to Arthur, forgetting completely about the wardrobe. He was incredibly glad he'd managed to talk Owain out of making him wear female lingerie 'to complete the look', as he had a feeling, if Owain had gotten his own way, then this scene would be playing out very differently. Probably with Arthur in fits of giggles. Unless he was into all that stuff.

That was a thought. What _were_ Arthur's fetishes?

Meanwhile, Arthur was more worried about his pretty much naked sort-of boyfriend standing above him looking more like a God than Arthur had ever seen. This worried Arthur slightly however – yeah he and Alfred had been naked around each other… but it'd never been quite so… sexual as this. It'd been like, just getting out of the shower naked. Not let me seduce you with my body naked. They hadn't really ventured far in the sexual realms of their relationship. They had jerked off to the thoughts of one another, sure, but that was hardly a claim to fame – Alfred had once before now jerked off to a picture of a remotely sexualised Pokémon.

Alfred sat down on the bed next to Arthur, "Say Artie?"

Arthur simply nodded, too flustered to properly reply.

Alfred leaned in close to Arthur's neck, breath making Arthur's neck shiver pleasantly. Then, barely audibly, Alfred whispered, "Am I turning you on?"

Arthur couldn't stop the little squeak of alarm escaping his lips, "I – I – _no!_"

Silence for a moment as Alfred waited confidently.

"Yes," Arthur said, his voice cracking a little mid-speech.

Alfred needn't say anymore. He tilted Arthur' chin towards his own, claiming the first kiss they'd shared in a while. Arthur responded very positively.

It wasn't long before Arthur shared Alfred's naked status.

"So…" Arthur began, stammering and blushing wildly.

Alfred too had lost his confidence. Both he and Arthur were now two naked teenagers who thought they knew what they were doing.

"I don't want… sex," Arthur admitted. "But I do feel that I'm ready to do pretty much anything… up till then."

Alfred smiled bashfully; confidence restored a little, "That's exactly how I feel."

"Can I just…" Arthur trailed off, bringing his shaking hand up to Alfred's face, gently cupping his cheek, and then swiftly removing his glasses, and folded them up and placed them on the floor.

"Thank you," Alfred said, leaning down for a kiss.

The rest of the day flew past in a rush of kisses, moans, even a few screams. Well on into the night the pair continued, their adrenaline extinguishing any exhaustion as they tried out things on each other that they'd only ever dreamed of previously.

* * *

Alastair sat outside the dorm, playing Tetris on his phone. There wasn't a peep out of the pair for at least half an hour. Just as Alastair was thinking of leaving, he was made to stay by little noise, only just audible through the door. He frowned, wondering if they'd begun fighting over all. He stood up, pressing his ear against the door. A few seconds later, another muffled noise came through the door. A grunt? Were they fist fighting?

Alastair prepared himself to run in like a Scottish Hero; he may or may not have ruffled up his hair and stroked his eyebrows into place. He was ready to burst in before…

"_Alfred…!"_

A moan followed the name.

The colour drained out of Alastair's face. Holy shit, holy shit. He just realised what was going on in that room. Nope, nope, nope, nope. He was _not_ listening to his little brother shout sexual things!

He hastily grabbed his coat and bag and ran off down the corridor, deciding to wait in his own room to tell Owain that there was no worries about Arthur and Alfred breaking up.

Well at least their pointless argument was fixed now.

On the way back down the corridor, he saw three people he never had expected to see all together at once.

Kiku was standing in between Mr Karpusi and a shady looking guy with spikey up, blonde hair.

_Lars?_

Ahh this was the dreaded meeting of the three. Alastair had heard a lot about Kiku's confusion in regards to his feelings towards Heracles. Lars must've found something out.

Alastair didn't really want to butt in, so he quickly skipped past, vowing he'd found out what happened from Gilbert later. Gilbert always knew these things.

Meanwhile back in the corridor with Kiku, things were getting pretty heated, in a way Kiku didn't like.

It'd all been a misunderstanding in the worst way possible.

Kiku had decided to confess to Lars about what he'd done with Heracles. It was the only way to set things right. If Lars wanted to break up with him after that, then Kiku wouldn't blame him.

It'd all been going quite smoothly too. Well, as smoothly as things could possibly get.

Kiku had waited outside for Lars, and they'd walked into the school together, casually talking about your average meaningless _stuff_. Then they'd reached inside. Lars had wanted to know what Kiku had called him all the way up to the school for.

"Well, um…" Kiku looked at the floor, ashamed. "There is no way to put this nicely, Lars. I went on a date with Heracles the other night whenever I said I wanted to see the fireworks with you. I lied to you, and I was out with him. And, before I went to go and find you on my way back… He kissed my forehead. Before you say anything, I want you to know that I regret what I did, and completely understand if you feel I've wrecked this relationship."

Lars had sighed at this point, running his hand through his hair and then down his face exasperatedly, "I know, Kiku."

"You, you _what?"_

"I saw the kiss."

"… Oh."

There was silence for a moment, and Lars leaned against the corridor wall, "I started smoking again."

Kiku stared at the floor, realising what Lars was telling him indirectly.

"And the stuff I'm smoking isn't exactly legal."

"… _Oh_," Kiku said, too shocked at both himself and Lars to say anything else.

He'd done this. This was his fault that Lars was inhaling dangerous substances into his body, not only risking illness, but also legal issues. Maybe Kiku didn't get him into drugs, but he wasn't helping Lars stop them either.

Then Kiku realised the crushing fatality of his situation, and began to tear up.

"I'm sorry," Kiku said through his tears, "I don't even have the right to be crying here! I – I just I never even thought…"

"I know why you're crying," Lars shrugged, "You're crying because you're scared for me. Yeah, you went on a date with Heracles. It doesn't mean that everything you do from now on is cruel and twisted. Kiku, _you_ haven't changed, it's our relationship that's changed."

Kiku nodded, "But if I hadn't gone on that date with Heracles, then none of this would've _happened! _We could've sat and watched the fireworks and it'd have been so nice and, and, and," Kiku couldn't get his words out any more. He just ended up stuttering.

Lars sighed, pulling Kiku into a hug, "I understand, I do. It happened to a friend of mine."

"But this is wrong even now! You're meant to be upset, not me! I'm meant to be comforting you! Now I've managed to turn all the attention on myself… I didn't want to do this…" Kiku sobbed helplessly.

"Kiku, Kiku, just calm, yeah? If it helps, I'm not going to break up with you."

Kiku's sobbing increased. Lars sighed helplessly, apparently that just added to Kiku's guilt. He decided that he just needed to carry on regardless of Kiku's crying. "Look, I won't break up with you. I understand it wasn't a date to make me mad; it was a date to satisfy the Greek's raging hormones that he should be able to control. You didn't do it to upset me, I get that. Yeah I'm hurt by what you did… but if I'm honest, right now I'm in a dark place, and you're my only light. Even if you burn me a bit, I'm not going to let go of you and just wonder around blind."

Kiku's sobbing increased, "I'm sorry, I'm so, so sorry Lars. There – There has to be something I can do to make it up to you?"

"Well, obviously promising you won't do that again… But also, this isn't just for my good, it's for _everyone's_ good in this situation… You need to give Heracles a talking to. Tell him that you can't do anything remotely romantic with him until you're out of school. If, by that time we're still together, but you want to leave me for him, then yeah, I might put up a fight, but I'll let you go to him."

"Lars! No, you need to stand up for what you want!"

"Kiku, I just don't _care_ anymore, that's my _point_."

Kiku was about to say something before he saw a person that he _really_ didn't want to see walk down the corridor. Only bloody Heracles himself.

"Kiku, is everything okay?" Heracles asked.

"Yes, everything is fine. Go away," Lars answered flatly.

"Excuse me?" Heracles frowned, meeting Lars' cold glare with an equally icy reply.

Kiku was about to butt in to ask them to please stop with the fighting, until he realised that not only did he not really have the right to butt in, but if he did, then he'd probably only make things worse.

"So what did you threaten Kiku with to get him to go on a date with you, Karpusi?" Lars asked coldly.

"Don't know what you're talking about, it is Lars, I can presume?" Heracles very nearly sneered, though he gave Kiku alarmed eyes of '_you told him!?'_

It was at this point that Alastair had walked past, head ducked and looking guilty. The three waited for him to go past, not particularly wanting their discussion turning into gossip already.

As soon as he'd gone though, Heracles spoke again.

"My date with Kiku was a simple deal, Lars. I said that if he enjoyed the date and wanted to do it again, then so be it. However if Kiku didn't enjoy it, then fine; it'd be over. I promised I wouldn't harass him anymore. A fair chance to give myself a chance to prove to him I was the right one to love."

"And what was his answer after the date?"

There was silence for a moment as both Heracles and Kiku realise Kiku didn't really give an answer.

"Very good question. Kiku, what was your answer?"

Kiku froze, suddenly realising that the outcome of this situation now rested on his shoulders.

He knew what to say. Rather he knew what he _should_ say. This was the part where he broke up with Heracles, saying that it could never work because of their student/teacher relationship and that he was in love with Lars. He did want to say that, too. Though the words didn't want to come out of his mouth.

_No, _Kiku told himself. _Even if you don't want to, this is what Lars wants. You have to do everything you can to make it better for him now_.

"Look, Heracles-san…" Kiku started, looking at the floor, "I'd be lying if I said I didn't enjoy our date. Though I simply can't date you. Not only is it pretty much illegal, but it's hurting _Lars._ Perhaps, I don't know, we might be together in a few years. But no, not now. I'm… I'm sorry."

Silence again.

"Kiku, do you really mean that, or are you just saying it because you want to do what I asked you to do?" Lars said calmly.

Kiku took a deep breath. No lies here. "At first, if I'm honest, I thought I was simply doing what you wanted me to. But I realise right now that actually, this is what I want. By doing this, not only am I being with the person that I'm in love with, but it's stopping you, Heracles, from getting into trouble with work, and it's definitely helping you, Lars, a little bit with… well… addictions. This is my final answer; Heracles, I do not want to have any form of romantic contact with you for at least four years until I graduate. I will miss you, but that is what is for the best for me and for the situation."

More silence. Kiku found it rather off-putting.

"I understand," Heracles said considerately. He took a step away from Lars. He realised this was a situation where he had to act his age. "Thank you, Kiku, Lars. I'm sorry for what I've put you through. But just remember, if it's four years you're letting me wait, then you'd better watch out until then. I'll make sure I'm the most attractive Greek man you've ever seen. There's no way you won't be able to fall for me, Kiku."

Lars nodded at Heracles, "Thank you for… cooperating."

"One of us has to be the adult. Don't forget your English homework, Honda."

* * *

A few days later, everything seemed to have calmed down. No one was randomly crying in a corridor, nor was anyone skipping class. Exams were on the horizon and that was the main worry for the moment. Things had patched themselves up for the most part.

But then there were the 'Lonely Trio' as people had taken to calling them. The three that, no matter what they did, they managed to fuck up relationships.

First on the list, emboldened and underlined many times was of course Alastair. Close by was Gilbert, and finally Matthew. These three had now gained their infamous reputation. Alastair and Gilbert could deal with it. They didn't care that they were fucked up lonely bisexuals that occasionally fucked each other just for the fun of it.

Matthew however wasn't fond of the status.

He'd tried to get out of the situation by letting the Old Matthew flourish; the part of him that everyone remembered from before he fucked up big time with his relationship with Gilbert, cheating affair with Francis and odd kiss here and there with Owain and Alfred.

However no matter what he did, he remained a proud part of the trio.

Until one day, however. Matthew decided that not only did he not want to be like this anymore, he actually missed someone very, very important to him.

Gilbert.

In the relationship, Matthew had taken the German for granted in such a way that should be illegal. He knew that it was truly horrible what he did. He'd never really apologised for what he did.

He could change that.

After a few days of planning on how to fix things, Matthew finally decided that he should just go and talk to Gilbert.

So go to talk to Gilbert he did indeed.

He knocked on the door, waiting for Gilbert to poke out his head like usual. Sure enough, there was that silvery hair and those bright red eyes.

"Mattie?" Gilbert said, shocked. He wasn't sure whether it was a pleasant surprise or a very unpleasant surprise for Gilbert. Probably the latter.

"Look Gilbert…" Matthew said, "I'm not going to beat around the bush. I was a dick when I dated you. I'm sorry for how I treated you. I just feel I didn't really leave the slate clean, and I feel terrible about that. I just wanted you to know that I'm sorry. Partly to get it off my conscience, I admit."

"Umm…" Gilbert said, "O-oh okay. Um, do you want to come inside?"

"I don't really mind, I just wanted to apologise for being a dick really."

"That's it? No sudden 'please take me back I love you my awesome God Gilbert'?"

"Umm… No not really, sorry if you were expecting that. I just wanted to make it as good as it could be between us. No bad feeling, if you get me."

"Matt, I'm not one to hold grudges, but if I was, a simple 'sorry' wouldn't really have helped that."

Matthew sighed, looking at the floor, "I know, I know… I just… I didn't know what to do…"

"How about we start over? From the very beginning. Look see?" Gilbert smiled, closing his door on Matthew.

Matthew stood in confusion, staring at the door. Had Gilbert just done the real life equivalent of hanging up on him?

Apparently not, Matthew realised as Gilbert opened the door again.

"Wow stranger who are you and why are you on my doorstep?" Gilbert narrowed his eyes.

"What? Gilbert I don't know what you're doing…"

"How the holy hell do you know my name? You some sort of stalker?"

Matthew soon caught on to what Gilbert was doing. He tried a few times to get Gilbert to stop with his charade. However Gilbert would not stop.

Soon however, Matthew lapsed into the conversation.

"Cool, so you go to school here too? And you're Canadian. Wow man I thought you were American, I'm sure you get that a lot," Gilbert said.

"I do. It's not particularly fun."

"You look pretty down in the dumps, man," Gilbert said, a little concern showing in his voice.

"Well if I'm honest, I am. I fucked things up, Gilbert. A guy I really, really liked. He was lovely, and I went and fucked with him."

"Did you love that guy?" Gilbert asked ionnocently.

"I wouldn't say love, but he was a very, very dear friend to me." Matthew admitted, "Though I'd take him back at any chance I could. He's way too good for me."

"Hey, Matthew, why don't you come in? I was just going to order some pizza?" Gilbert grinned.

"Sure thing, as long as there's ice cream," Matthew smiled, and the two walked inside Gilbert's room for the first time of their second try.

This could well be the way to a fixed friendship, Matthew thought happily to himself. Hell he didn't deserve it, but at least he could ensure he didn't fuck up again this time. Friendship #2; the one where nothing goes wrong, hopefully.

**A/N**

**Ahaaaaaaaaaaa. Yeah. I'm back. You all hate me don't you? ;u; don't worry I'd hate me too.  
BUT I UPDATED! YAY!  
I owe you all an explanation, and if I'm honest I don't really have one. But I'm sorry for where I left it ;u;  
Though I'd say there's about a chapter left? ;u; sorry.  
I kinda started to hate this fic; it's really annoying me. I've realised that the characters are really bdly potrayed and DON'T GET ME STARTED ON THE PLOTHOLES UGH.  
But yes, I have plans to write another Highschool AU pretty soon. That one will be planned. It'll be a USUK, and yes it'll probably be quite similar to this u.u for that, I apologise, I just really like the idea at the minute.  
You can think of it as a rewritten version of this, if you like.**

But yes, as always, thank you for your kind, kind reviews! Even as I was on my horrible unintended hiatus, they still came through! Thank you, guys!


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